


Five for Silver

by K_dAzrael, TheHummingbirdMoth



Category: Marvel 616, Thor (Comics)
Genre: Clonecest, M/M, dubcon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-18
Updated: 2011-07-31
Packaged: 2017-10-22 07:10:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/235259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_dAzrael/pseuds/K_dAzrael, https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheHummingbirdMoth/pseuds/TheHummingbirdMoth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Futurefic prompted by a panel in <i>Latverian Prometheus</i> where Victor von Doom steals Loki’s DNA to attain a better understanding of said trickster. We made it our headcanon that Doom has a harem of Loki clones. Said clones eventually end up in Asgard, where they decide that Doom = king and Balder = king, therefore Balder = Doom. Balder suddenly finds himself in charge of five very <s>creepy</s> affectionate, half-naked Lokis who really, <i>really</i> like baths.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> K_dAzrael is the author of chapters 1, 3, and 5, TheHummingBirdMoth is the author of chapters 2, 4, and 6.

Victor von Doom held out his hand and a hemostatic clamp was immediately placed into the cradle of his palm.

On the table his latest subject gasped its last, gills fluttering as the mouth opened and closed uselessly in the wrong medium. Doom made a sound of annoyance and laid down his implements.

“‘Homo sapiens superior’ indeed – this species has no stamina.”

Doom stretched out his arms and two deft sets of hands stripped off his latex gloves. He then turned and was presented with a goblet of wine, which he drank down immediately. He shifted his gaze to the far corner of the room where the fifth attendant sat, absorbedly sewing up the hem of one of his ceremonial cloaks, dark hair a spill over a pale-skinned toned chest.

“Come, my beauties,” Doom announced. “I believe it is time for bed.”

Ten green eyes turned to look at him and as he led the way to the door ten footsteps fell in with his.

Yes, it was a good day to be the lord of Latveria, Doom reflected from the comfort of his huge, ornately-carved bed. There were two warm and obliging bodies to his left and two to his right; one lay curled up at his feet.

“My beauties,” he told them, “I have business that calls me away tomorrow.” Anxious hands touched his chest in a possessive caress at this. “Do not fret,” he said in paternalistic tones of indulgence. “You will not be long without a king.”

*~*~*

Thor strode down another of Castle Doom’s tortuous and poorly-lit corridors. “How long do we have, Tony Stark?”

Behind him, Iron Man chimed in after a beat: “Intel says the extradition order won’t stick on this one – Doom’s claiming diplomatic immunity and racial discrimination. We’ve got a few hours at the most to check out what kind of horrors this place holds before he’s on a private jet back.”

They split up, Thor offering to assist Captain America in searching the North wing. As he approached Doom’s personal quarters he saw a white-faced Steve Rogers exiting a room and leaning his back against the door, horror and something oddly like guilt flashing in his eyes when he caught sight of Thor.

“What have you found, my friend?”

Steve stared wildly at him for a moment before blurting out: “you don’t want to go in there, Thor.”

“I have seen atrocities before, Steven. Is it another dissection room?’

“No – I mean, yes! Corpses everywhere, so... don’t go in, ok?”

Thor narrowed his eyes. He had grown up in the presence of a master liar, and Steve Rogers was no master liar.

As he pushed past the anxious hero he found himself entering a room which appeared to have been plunged into an artificial twilight. When his eyes adjusted to the dimness and his lungs to the fug of incense, he began to make out humanoid shapes lounging among the many cushions that littered the room.

Thor stepped closer and saw five faces peering curiously at him from the gloom; faces that were as familiar as they were identical.

He let out a startled cry: “Loki!”

*~*~*

“They... don’t appear to be my brother’s shades. Those are temporary and insubstantial.” Thor pondered them for a further moment. “No. Loki has looked upon me with love, with rage and with hatred, but never with indifference. These are not of his making – they know me not.”

With his faceplate flipped up, Tony stark stroked his short beard in thought as he contemplated the five pseudo-Lokis. “I figure they’re clones. Doom got hold of your brother’s DNA somehow and made himself some copies. Loki’s body, but not his memories.”

“Why would Doom do such a thing?” Thor demanded. “What are they for?” He caught Tony and Steve giving each other sheepish looks.

“Given how they’re dressed...” Steve gestured to the nearest clone’s lower half, which was draped in a long skirt made from a faintly-diaphanous silvery cloth that looked like a very finely woven raw silk. Apart from a pair of soft-soled slippers, it was the only item of clothing that the clone wore. “Well, let’s just say they’re not dressed for fighting.”

“Yeeeeeeeah,” said Tony, giving a low whistle. “That Doom’s one sick puppy.”

“You think he uses them for...” Thor seemed to grow in stature as his indignation swelled, his countenance darkening like a storm-struck sky. “MONSTER.”

“So... what are we going to do with them?” Tony asked, breezily practical. “I mean, they seem a little big to turn over to child services.”

“If they are made after my brother then they are Asgardians, and must be returned to their rightful home.”

Tony grimaced. “You sure that’s a good idea, Thor? I mean, we’ve all seen what one Loki did to your world. You sure you want five of them hanging around?”

“What would you suggest?” Thor folded his arms across his chest. “That we have them put down, like unwanted pets?”

Tony looked appropriately chastened. “No... I guess not.”

“My brother Balder will see them well cared for,” Thor reasoned. “He is a man of great compassion and patience.” He stepped closer to the five Lokis and drew himself up straighter to make a formal address. “You do not speak, but you understand me, do you not?”

The Loki clones exchanged a significant glance, then looked back to him and nodded.

“You do not know me, but I am your foster brother. My name is Thor, god of thunder and son of Odin Allfather. If you come with me I will lead you to your true home, and your true king. You will be safe there and–”

The foremost of the clones raised one finger to command Thor’s silence. There was another intense silent conference between the five, then as one they nodded and rose to their feet.

Thor blinked at them. “well that was... easier than I expected.”

*~*~*

“Are you sure about this?” Heimdall asked, stony-faced as ever. “Because I feel I am remiss in my duty even to let these creatures set foot inside Asgard’s walls.”

The five Lokis stood upon the bifrost in a semi-circle, holding one another’s hands and looking about themselves with considerable interest, eyes shrewdly glittering.

“They may be misbegotten, but they are our kinsmen and so deserving of our care.”

“Technically they are the Jotun’s kin. Could you not deposit them there?”

“Do not try my patience Heimdall. Loki is my true brother, I have always said so,” Thor blustered.

“Very well,” Heimdall obediently stood aside before intoning solemnly: “but let the record state that I was against this.”

*~*~*

“Behold,” Thor bellowed, leading the procession down the central aisle of the throne room. “The Hliðskjálf, high seat of the Norse gods, whereupon only the king and his chosen queen might sit. Hail, Balder the Bright, ruler of Asgard.”

Balder rose to his feet and broke into a fond smile at Thor’s approach. “A poor steward, Thor, while business in Midgard keeps you hence.”

“You are too modest, Balder. You have ever been Asgard’s loyal protector - the crown sits more fittingly upon your brow than ever it did upon mine.”

The Odinsons clapped one another in an embrace and as they drew apart Balder took in the faces of those in Thor’s retinue. “What does Loki here?” he asked. “And what trickery is it that he is several? Why is he dressed so?”

“Ah,” the good-natured smile promptly vanished from Thor’s face. “About that...”

*~*~*

Balder looked pale and sick as he listened to the other god’s tale. “To think I once accepted that tyrant’s hospitality!”

The five Lokis had taken to clustering about him. One stood behind the throne, arms linked around Balder’s neck and chin on the top of his head. One sat either side of him on the arms of the Hliðskjálf, inclining their bodies against his sides and resting their heads on his shoulders. Two sank at his feet and leaned their cheeks against Balder’s knees, absently stroking the curve of his calf muscles.

Balder shifted uncomfortably. “And you say they don’t speak? Do I understand aright – these are Lokis that don’t _speak_?”

“Tony Stark believes Doom may have designed them that way.”

Balder raised his eyes to the vaulted ceiling. “In self-defence, no doubt. Are they always this... affectionate?”

“They have not been so with me. It is perhaps that you are their king – they seemed very taken with that idea.”

Balder threw his brother a resentful look. As if sensing his tension, the standing clone caressed Balder’s cheek and nuzzled into his hair.

“Yes well,” Thor coughed. “I must return to Midgard forthwith...”

“Thor, don’t you dare leave me alone with them. Thor!” Balder struggled to rise, but found himself greatly encumbered by his new admirers. “If Asgard burns to the ground it shall not be my fault, thunderer!”

“I trust you, Balder,” Thor called back, already striding down the aisle at a fast clip that looked suspiciously like a retreat.

*~*~*

Volstagg squinted into his tankard and then towards the table’s end.

“My friends, have the fumes of this excellent ale overcome my bodily senses, or are there truly _five_ of them?”

“Alas,” Fandral replied, “your senses do not lie to you. There are indeed five tricksters surrounding our benighted king.”

“Would that mine eyes had been gouged from their sockets long before this day,” Sif added with a sort of dark melodrama.

“Is it an evil scheme, do you think?” Volstagg queried.

“If so...” Fandral answered, “it is truly a bizarre one.”

At the other end of the board Balder long-sufferingly accepted another tidbit from one of the clones’ fingers. There was seemingly nothing he could do to stop them from selecting the most tempting morsels and feeding them to him. If he tried to refuse one of their offerings the clone in question would frown disapprovingly at him and push the food against his lips as if he was a recalcitrant toddler until Balder relented and opened his mouth.

In place of the absent Odin, it was his queen who sat in the head seat of the top table. “It doesn’t seem entirely decent to have them go about half-naked,” Frigga commented.

“I don’t think that they get cold,” said Balder. “It is, I suppose, the frost giant heritage.”

“But what will visitors say of Asgard? That we employ concubinage, or worse, that we cannot even clothe our own people?”

Managing for a second to deflect an offering of food, Balder reassured her: “I have given orders for the making of new garments for them.”

“You know, Balder, it warms my heart to look upon them.” Frigga cast an indulgent maternal eye on the five clones. “Loki was ever so affectionate as a child.”

“They are not children, my lady,” Balder replied around a mouthful of stuffed date that had just been forced upon him. “By my reckoning it is at least a score years since Loki was last in Latveria.”

Fury clouded Frigga’s brow and Balder thought, with a fresh spark of insight, how much alike she and Thor truly were. “I shudder to think what that vile man was doing with them all this time. And such sweet-natured creatures as they are. See how they dote upon you.”

“I just wish they would stop following me everywhere. It is... unsettling to say the least.”

“Perhaps they see you as their protector,” Frigga gazed at him, leaning her cheek upon her hand. “I dare say they are good judges of character.”

Not for the first time, a suspicion rose in Balder’s mind that the queen was making sport of him. He frowned until one of the Lokis kissed his temple and took the opportunity to push half a walnut into his shocked mouth.

*~*~*

“This is your own room,” Balder gestured around himself. “See, here is a mattress for each of you.”

As Balder moved towards the door the five clones made to follow. “No, no,” he chided gently. “It’s time for bed now. The servants will wake you for breakfast.” As he took another step towards the exit, so did they.

“Look,” he said, sighing in exasperation, “you are not in any danger here. No one will touch you against your will, or disturb your sleep. Here are all things for your comfort and all you need do is lie down and take some rest until morning.”

The clones looked at each other, then back at Balder.

 _They are following you_. Balder tried not to break into an unkingly dash as he headed down the hallway to his own chambers, and nor did he dare look back.

He made it beyond his own door and swiftly locked it, pretending obliviousness to the faint scratching from without.

After an hour a disgruntled servant knocked to complain through the door that the five Lokis were greatly impeding everyone’s business by slumping on the floor, making it hazardously wet with their incessant tears and terrifying the serving maids with their eerie voiceless sobs.

Balder sighed again – beyond exasperation now – and opened the door, ushering the five inside. He told himself he simply imagined the shared smirks which flashed between them as they crossed his threshold.

Balder climbed back beneath the covers and gestured to his adjoining closet. “You can sleep on the floor, there are extra blankets in there and–” Even as he said these words he knew, with a special sort of inevitability, that not one of the Lokis had the slightest intention of curling up on his floor. The five lined up by his bedside and daintily stepped out of their thin-soled shoes and then their long skirts.

Balder blushed and averted his eyes as they clambered in next to him, each finding a place and settling into it as if invited. The clones closest to him wriggled their way under his arms, resting their heads on his chest. Limbs draped across him from every possible angle.

Hot and deeply uncomfortable, Balder lay awake for several hours staring at his ceiling.

The Lokis, by contrast, were all blissfully and sweetly slumbering within five minutes of invading his bed.

*~*~*

Balder was still mostly in the grip of a heavy and exhausted sleep, aware only that he was warm and that someone was very softly nipping his jaw line and breathing ticklishly on his neck.

“Mmm,” he smiled and shifted, dipping his head to find his bedmate’s mouth with his own. It had been too long since his duties allowed him to make a conquest of one of the Asgardian court’s many beauteous and passionate women. Soft, plaint lips pressed against his and a wicked, knowing tongue slipped out to touch his own.

Eyes still closed, Balder gave himself over to the kiss, moaning appreciatively as a hand closed around his prick, which was hard beneath the thin leggings he had for some reason that currently escaped him managed to retain.

It wasn’t until he felt the teeth of a second mouth closing on his right nipple that it occurred to him something was amiss.

“Agh!” Balder’s eyes flicked open as he gave a violent start.

The uppermost Loki to his left (the one that had apparently been kissing him) pursed his lips as if to say “shh”, laying his fingers across Balder’s mouth while his eyes danced with a mocking light.

Before he could protest further, the three clones who were furthest down the bed swiftly stripped off his leggings, one moving between his thighs with an intent look on his face.

“Listen to me,” Balder began hoarsely. “You don’t have to do this. I don’t expect it of you. I am not your master and your wills are your own.”

The Loki on his right quirked an eyebrow as if to say “well, _naturally_ ,” then very deliberately licked Balder’s ear.

The clone lying on his belly between Balder’s legs stroked his thighs, nails scratching lightly. He was staring at Balder’s prick – which lay fully erect against his hip – and in his expression was an unmistakeable hunger. Balder felt his loins throb at the sight and a bead of semen slowly swelled forth, causing the clone to dip his elegant head and quickly lap it up with the flat of his tongue.

The Loki to that one’s left touched his semblable’s shoulder and took his pointed chin in his hand, pressing their mouths together – tasting Balder on the other, the god of light realised dimly.

“Oh,” he said flatly, watching in fascination as the clones kissed one another in a chain, lingeringly sucking on one another’s tongues. “That’s... that’s very... wrong. You really shouldn’t...”

Left-hand Loki shook his head and shushed Balder with another lip-purse before leaning down to thoroughly distract him with a kiss. Balder could detect the very faint tang of his own seed and – _oh, that shouldn’t be arousing_.

Balder stopped censuring himself when the clone lying between his legs swallowed his prick almost to the hilt in one smooth motion, pulling back to slurp greedily at the head while the other four looked on in envious fascination, caressing Balder’s body and rutting against him in a languorous rhythm.

It didn’t take much of this attention for Balder to start moaning in that deep, regular pattern that meant he was very close. Demonstrating an excellent sense of timing, the clone who had been sucking him pulled off and let him spill his seed into the hollow of his stomach, where the others joined the first in licking him clean, shifting urgently against Balder until they all found their own orgasms, their soft panting the only sounds in the room.

 _Realm of the dishonoured dead here I come_ , thought Balder bitterly, stroking the two dark-haired heads currently propped on his chest.

“Alright,” he said, struggling to sit up beneath the weight of many boneless limbs. “Into the bathing chamber with you all. We smell like an atrocity.”

*~*~*

Immersed in the scented water of the huge sunken bath, Balder watched with rush of sudden fondness as the five clones tended to one another (this was, of course, _after_ they had attended to Balder - scrubbing and kneading every part of him as he protested weakly at their over-zealous, somewhat painful treatment).

“You need names,” he said, thinking aloud. “I can’t keep calling you ‘Lokis’. You are individuals.”

One of the clones finished combing his fingers through another Loki’s hair and crossed to drape his arms around Balder’s neck, nuzzling him. Balder found himself wondering which it was – the one who had pleasured him? The one who had kissed him? The one who had reached orgasm against the hollow of his back? He felt shamed at his utter failure to tell. Yet they were _identical_ \- down to the placement of each mole and freckle on their skin.

“Now, how do I even begin to tell you all apart?”

Balder thought he detected a mocking edge to the nearest clone’s smile at this.

(He told himself he must be imagining it.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fanart (NSFW!) for this chapter by the inimitable Soltian: [click here!](http://thor-slash.livejournal.com/41358.html#cutid1)
> 
> I'm aware that in classic Thor comics the Hliðskjálf is in a different place from the throne room (on top of a mountain for the most panoramic view), but I moved it because... um, poetic licence. Ok?


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> By [](http://hummingbirdmoth.livejournal.com/profile)[**hummingbirdmoth**](http://hummingbirdmoth.livejournal.com/)

By the time Balder emerged from the bath, the sun was rising.

After towelling him dry for ten minutes than was necessary, the clones lined up to comb one another’s hair with their long, thin fingers, like a troop of baboons at grooming time. The one at the front of the queue was inspecting Balder’s helmet, twisting the tassels around his finger. Balder wondered what he was thinking.

The next moment, in obedience to an unspoken signal, they broke apart, and converged on him with lightning speed (the way they moved, like one organism with five separate parts to it, mercy but it was eerie).

Ten hands set about buttoning his undershirt, tying his belt, one of them producing a razor and, with quick, darting movements, shaving his chin to a polished smoothness before he could raise any objection.

How quick with a blade that one is, he thought, and resolved to commit his face to memory. Only to realise a moment later, as they swapped places and shifted around, that he could no longer say with absolute certainty which he was. Was he the one who had lingered over the helmet? The one who had scrubbed his back in the bath? The way they weaved in amongst one another, clustering and spreading out and clustering again, it would have been easier to pick out one zebra in a herd of thirty than to single out the one with the hands that needed watching.

Lastly, they solemnly brought him his helmet, adjusting it this way and that until its placement met with their standards. Then they stepped back, as one, and stood assembled, their hands clasped in front of them.

It had taken them less time to dress him and ready him for the day than it normally took him to put on his socks.

“Thank you,” he said. “You are… very skilled. I would return the favour, but…”

As he gestured to their fragile skirts, he remembered what he’d planned to do today.

“And now,” he said, “if you would all come with me…”

0

Each outfit was a different colour.

One of them picked up a cape, and sniffed it. One picked up a pair of leggings, exchanged a glance with the one of his immediate right, and set about tying it in knots.

Maybe, he thought suddenly, they didn’t know how to dress themselves. Would Doom have ever had them in anything but the skirts?

Pity moved him to attempt a demonstration. Approaching the closest one, he put his arms through the holes of a blue shirt, and attempted to get him to duck his head so he could pull the rest of the shirt down over him.

As he did so, he felt a tugging at his waist, and a second later found himself blinded as his own shirt was pulled up over his head.

“Oh no, no, this is not what I want, I…”, he said, but perhaps his voice was muffled (or perhaps they were disobeying him on purpose?) for they did not stop. The one he had been trying to clothe… he never knew how he did it, but he made a strange twisting motion, and suddenly the shirt Balder had been trying to put on him was neatly plucked from Balder’s hands. Smooth bodies pressed against him amidst a flurry of linen, and one soft, cheeky pair of lips seized the opportunity to steal an extra kiss while his vision was obscured.

When the veil lifted, he was wearing the blue shirt.

He tried again. This time, he had six of the servants come in and hold one of them in place while he applied the shirt, and the pants, and the boots.

It was obvious the poor thing was wretchedly uncomfortable, fidgeting this way and that, scratching at the fabric as though it itched. He cast Balder a plaintive look, which Balder returned with am encouraging smile. “Well? I understand they may feel unusual at first, but given time I’m sure you’ll adjust…”

The clone’s lower lip began to tremble. It ducked its chin and stared morosely at the floor while the other four came to its aide. Tenderly, they stroked their benighted fifth’s back and nuzzled his neck, kissed his cheek to soothe him and glanced at Balder with…

Disappointment. We thought you were better, Balder imagined those looks were saying. Haven’t we been good to you? Haven’t we been obedient? And now you’ve done this terrible thing, and we don’t know what we did to deserve it.

They made no sound, but if they did, it would have been the whimpering of kicked puppies.

Hands tightly linked with the fifth’s, they clung to one another, long eyelashes glittering with unshed tears, until he felt sufficiently monstrous to ask the servants to remove the clothing. At the end of the day, Balder Everfool had no capacity for cruelty, even for propriety’s sake.

As soon as he was disrobed, the fifth flung his arms around Balder’s neck, and the other four shortly followed. All the misery and resentment that had gathered like a cloud overhead evaporated into a happy pink maze of indecently exposed limbs.

They were snuggling him. He was being snuggled by Loki. A great deal of Loki.

Truly, the universe was vast, and contained many miracles untold.

“This is not the end of it,” he warned them, as they purred against him soundlessly and tugged him towards the bedroom yet again. “I shall think of something else.”

0

“You shall be Lin,” Balder said. “And you are Lark. You, Lure. You shall be Loft and you, let me think…Lest.”

He made them up on the spot; short, easy to remember carrying no obvious portents or expectations. Meaningless names were always best, he thought, however much Asgardian parents liked to give their offspring names that spoke of greatness still to come; it was better that a child be allowed to choose what their name meant.

They clearly thought nothing of their new names, eyes flickering between one another- was that how they communicated? They had no sign language, and, according to Thor, either lacked any magical ability altogether or else were remarkably adept at hiding it. The first option ruled out telepathy.

“Hold still,” he said to the one he had decided to name Lark. “This will only be a temporary measure until I think of a better way of differentiating you.”

He hadn’t wanted to brand them like cattle, so tattoos had been out of the question. The ink he was applying with his fingertips would wash off, and would need to be reapplied constantly- he’d have to work out a way to keep them out of the bath until their new identities had cemented themselves.

After he was done marking each one, they craned their necks to see what he had done, putting him endearingly in mind of dogs chasing their tails.

“You can’t reach them,” he said. “I’ve put them there to make it harder for you to wipe them off.”

The problem with that was that they could simply wash off one another’s, but he didn’t have a better solution for now.

Standing up, he wiped the ink from his hands. “It is late in the morning and duty calls. I would prefer it if you would remain here and find some innocuous way of amusing yourselves until I return. Otherwise, I can ask the Warriors Three to escort you about the palace and show you the grounds…”

They followed him to the throne room, in a neat procession, slippered feet making barely any sound on the stone.

0

They seemed predisposed to lounge.

Speedy as they were to obey his every whim, whenever they weren’t busy fondling him or feeding him, they would slump onto the nearest available surface with an unfair, effortless elegance, assuming poses that emphasised their full hips and long legs. Deliberately maximising their aesthetic appeal.

Doom would have wanted that, Balder thought. Decorative slaves.

Balder thought uneasily of Frigga’s words, and the implications of sitting in Odin’s throne- Odin’s throne!- with his scantily-clad ensemble surrounding him. Asgard had kept no sex slaves since long before Balder’s birth, but its royal family had often employed the services of men and women trained in the art of pleasure; Asgard’s sex workers were legendary throughout the Nine Realms, and among the richest of their citizens. To look at the clones, anyone would think that Balder had decided to mix business with pleasure, for they took up the spaces to his right and his left normally occupied by royal advisors.

The lounging made them seem as though they took up much more space than they actually did. One leaned against the wall directly behind him, observing the throne room through lidded eyes. From time to time he would gently massage Balder’s shoulders. One sat on the floor, leaning back against his knee. One LAY on the floor, leg drawn up, arms behind its head as if he thought the floor was a huge, ornate cushion. One –the one he had dubbed ‘Loft’, he thought, checking- sat to his left, head resting upon his shoulder. The fifth had tried to sit in his lap until he had spoken sharply, and now he leaned back upon the side of the Hliðskjálf, with his arms folded in what may have been a sulk.

Brunhilde was a Valkyrie, and, as such, had seen stranger things in her day than the herd (pack, maybe?) of Loki draping themselves about the king.

“TEN BARRELS!” she shouted, a vein in her forehead near to bursting. “The impudence cannot go unpunished, your highness!”

“Asgard produces nearly two million tons of wheat per year,” Balder said mildly.

“AND they dealt a fierce blow to the merchant’s head!”

“Does he yet live?”

Disgruntled, she said, “Yes. But he has a headache!”

“The Nine Realms are currently experiencing the first true period of peace in several thousand years,” said Balder. “You would have me endanger our truce with Nornheim for the sake of ten barrels of wheat and a merchant with a headache?”

“It is the principle of the thing,” Brunnhilde scowled.

Brunnhilde was older than he was, and this pettiness did not become her.

Ruling Asgardians at peace, Balder reflected, was like trying to keep sheepdogs as house pets. Their nerves became frazzled, they grew short-tempered and inclined to bark. Balder suspected, if the peace lasted (vain hope) that more and more of them would follow Thor to Midgard, where there were always battle to be joined, sides to take, and trouble to be allayed. Odin’s great kingdom might suffer a slow death, not from treachery within or enemies without, but from sheer boredom.

It was then that he felt it.

Seeing him start, Brunnhilde asked, “Are you well, my king?”

”Ah… yes. Yes. I… I am distracted. Carry on.”

The second time it happened there could be no mistaking the sensation of two slender fingers trailing down his back, and dealing his rump a pinch.

He crossed his legs in what he hoped was a casual manner. He had been famous for his blushes even as a child; when a girl had given him his first kiss, he had been lobster-red for a day and a half. How long would it take Brunnhilde to notice?

Which of them was it? The one resting its black head on his shoulder- Lure? The one standing behind him? The one by his knee? Treading on their toes would have been an option- but they wore no boots, only slippers, and he didn’t want to do them an injury. In their innocence and ignorance of court etiquette, they probably didn’t even realise they were doing anything wrong.

“Brunnhilde,” he said, hating to cut into her tirade, but suddenly desirous that the meeting reach its conclusion. “I shall take your fears into account, and I thank you for your counsel. Nonetheless, I feel that, at this sensitive juncture, it is better for Asgard and her people that we concentrate our efforts on maintaining a healthy and mutually beneficial relationship with Nornheim and her queen, and, as such, in the interests of diplomacy, I am, as Odin’s steward, prepared to let this one incident slide without immediately readying our armies for an invasion. ”

The third time they were more daring, the fingers sliding further in before closing for the pinch. If the blush didn’t give him away, the erection soon would.

“Then you are a BAD steward,” she said, gruffly.

The words hurt, but didn’t offend him greatly. She had fought beside him a hundred times and they both owed one another their lives; she had more than earned the right to speak freely before him.

The pinching had stopped. The clones’ gazes had been roving every which way, taking in the wonders of the throne room, the gold-leaf of the ceiling, the lavish white marble tile- beyond their blind devotion to him, they were endearingly curious. But when the valkyrie said that, every one of them became instantly attentive.

Their narrow, vulpine faces were exactly like Loki’s. But had he ever seen Loki observe anyone in that manner- eyes gleaming with intent, glossy with hunger?

What would Doom have wanted done to anyone who insulted him to his face?

“My decision is final,” he said, quickly. “I will send notice to the Norn Queen that the behaviour of her subjects will not be tolerated, and that if there are any further attacks on our merchants, she will pay in blood. Does that satisfy you?”

Not quickly enough. She’d noticed the way their demeanour had changed, and her hand had slipped an inch closer to her sword, before she remembered what it was to draw steel in the presence of the king.

“Yes,” she said, but her attention was no longer on him. Suddenly she was eyeing the clones in the same way that the Warriors Three, Tyr and Sif had when Balder had arrived at dinner with them.

When he had them in private once again, he reprimanded them sternly. “You must NEVER do that again. It was naughty of you.”

That was the wrong word to use- it made it sound as though he were scolding children, or bad dogs. Nonetheless, it got the message across. Their faces became apologetic; they displayed the true extent of their contrition by pushing him back onto the throne, climbing into his lap and doing things that would make him feel vaguely guilty and powerfully aroused every time he sat down in the throne room ever again.

0

In the evening, he sat in the library, having escaped them for an hour or so by asking them to sew up the holes in his clothing.

Mainly to catch his breath and indulge in a spot of quiet reading before turning in.

His eyes traced the words on the page, but his mind was scattered. And tired. After their antics ion the throne room, he had spent the larger portion of the day fending off their repeated advances, and the smaller portion of the day trying to convince them not to FOLLOW him everywhere.

Wasn’t it odd, how exceptionally libidinous they were? Balder wondered if that was a quality Doom had imbued them with- if he could remove the Liesmith’s ability to talk, why not make certain other alterations, to make the clones more compliant with his wants and wishes?

Vile man. What a pitiful judge of character was Balder the Bright.

(Poor, poor things, to have come into this world under the care of such a vile man.)

Or maybe he had done nothing of the sort. Loki had been his advisor for almost a year, and he had never, in Balder’s presence, displayed any signs of a lurking, wanton sexuality (apart from a few clumsy attempts to draw Balder’s eyes to his stolen form’s breasts. He’d stopped after two or three tries, and Balder had been left with the impression that the whole thing had been more a tactical experiment than any expression of actual desire on Loki’s part.) But perhaps that had been an act. Perhaps he had been sneaking lovers into his bedroom every night. Perhaps he was as skilled with his mouth as the clone who had lain between Balder's legs last night.

There was a third, darker alternative; that the clones did not desire him at all. That Doom had simply trained them to respond to his wants so well that they could no longer differentiate the desires they had from the desires their master wanted them to have. Gasping as they thrust against his side and caressed his limbs might be as mechanical an act to them as cutting fingernails.

Either way, his course was clear. He could not allow them to do it again. It was unhealthy for all parties involved.

His mind made up, he abandoned his sojourn in the library and return to his room. Underneath the door, he could see a line of yellow light; they were still awake. And waiting.

He wouldn’t send them out, he decided. They had come from a dark world into a light one with no preparation or time to adjust to the transition. For all their pretences, they were likely terrified by this new home, and obviously took comfort in his presence. He would allow them to sleep in his bed tonight, and reject their advances. If they persisted, he would leave the room and sleep elsewhere. Tomorrow, he would have five separate beds moved in- or maybe one extra bed large enough to accommodate five people, as they seemed to draw as much comfort from one another’s presence as they did from his.

He opened the door.

Everything was soaked in a golden glow. The fire was roaring; dozens of extra candles had been lit.

Four of the clones sat upright upon his bed. Entirely naked, and fresh from another bath, their wiry limbs wet and glistening.

In the centre of the bed lay the fifth, face down, legs spread just wide enough.

“Oh, no,” said Balder, weakly.

They were oiling him. All four, rubbing oil in the fifth’s back, with rhythmic, repeated motions. Two worked on his legs, one on his shoulders, one on his lower back. It was this one who slowly slipped a finger into him (was that one of the fingers that had so lewdly fondled his buttocks in the throne room?), and worked it deeper as he lazily writhed, hips rising off the bed a few inches. A second finger was added, and the fifth bucked, gasping.

Now that he looked closer, they’d clearly been takings turns. Each one gleamed, not with water, but with oil.

On the floor beside the bed were all the clothes he had asked them to repair, folded, and sporting evidence of expert stitch work.

The fifth turned his head at last, and caught Balder’s gaze with heavy, heated eyes. A second later, the other four turned, and in a flash, two were off the bed and at his side, caging him in.

They didn’t pull so much as guide him to the bed, like a man who’d lost his way. The one who was laid out was now resting his head on his hands, smiling at him in greeting, and he couldn’t tear his eyes away long enough to stop the other four from disrobing him.

“Aren’t you splendid?” he said to him, the words spilling out before he could stop them.

Four bodies stroked and oiled him as he crawled over the fifth, who released a slow, shuddering breath as he fell beneath Balder’s shadow.

In his haste, he forgot to look lower to see what his name was. Whoever he was, he was as tight, and as ready, as he looked.

Had he thought to compare them to concubines, or trained pleasurers? They were like nothing he’d ever encountered, able to anticipate his body better than any man or woman he had lain with. Ten constantly roving hands left no part of him to grow cold, neglected not one inch of his skin. None of them, he noted, made any attempt to penetrate him.

The clone peaked before he did, biting the sheets. With gentle yet firm hands, they pulled him off before he had finished. He was confused until the second one positioned itself before him, casting him a boldly flirtatious look over his shoulder.

Sinking into the second, his suspicions were confirmed. They were ALL thoroughly prepared. A vision of them taking turns spreading one another, working those long fingers deeper until each one of them was broken open assailed him, and he spent himself in the second with a sob.

They had him hard again in less than a minute- another first- and then the third was waiting for him, golden and dripping.

With this one, he took the time to take him in hand and stroke him in time with each thrust. Oddly, although it made the third shiver, it didn’t make him come any faster than the first had. Again they pulled him off as soon as the third had come, and now that he understood the game, he was able to hold out through the fourth, and the fifth, only giving in when the fifth started to shake beneath him.

By the time it was over his skin felt as though it could feel every individual current of air in the room. They hadn’t stopped touching him once. The skin on the back of his legs was as tender as the skin on his balls.

He rolled off the last one and kissed them all, one by one, then checked to see the name of the last one he had spent in.

The ink had been scrubbed off. In its place, in a perfect imitation of his own curling handwriting, the word ‘Loki’ had been scrawled.

Upon further investigation, he discovered that such was the case on all the rest of them.

“Am I correct in thinking that you don’t WANT me to tell you apart?” he sighed.

They exchanged a look. And one of them patted his head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fanart for this chapter by [](http://soltian.livejournal.com/profile)[**soltian**](http://soltian.livejournal.com/) : [The Clones' Gazes Had Been Roving Every Which Way](http://soltian.tumblr.com/post/8902149395/the-clones-gazes-had-been-roving-every-which)


	3. Chapter 3

“My friends! ... And Tyr!” Fandral began, throwing himself down on the edge of the bench at the breakfast table.

Volstagg, Hogun and Sif rolled their eyes at each other in heavy anticipation of their self-appointed leader’s newest harebrained scheme. Tyr alone seemed blissfully unaware of what he was in for.

“We have,” Fandral continued feelingly, pressing one hand to his chest, “a solemn duty to perform - one which has heretofore gone shamefully neglected! Regard, if you will, yon five...” here he paused, seemingly at a loss for a descriptive phrase to accompany the gesture that indicated the clones at the top table.

“Abominations?” Sif offered. “Things that should not be, but for the whims of a depraved dictator?”

“‘Persons’, shall we say?” Fandral supplied diplomatically, patting Sif’s shoulder to suggest cheerful camaraderie. “Yet, valiant Sif here has indeed hit at the heart of the matter! They are, we feel, somewhat uncanny. And why is this?”

“Because they are the traitor Loki,” Sif replied.

Fandral jabbed a finger in her direction. “Not so – they have none of the trickster’s memories, nor, so far as we can tell, command of either speech or sorcery. So what is it, truly, that unsettles us?”

“They don’t have belly buttons,” said Hogun. When Fandral leveled a deeply unimpressed look at him he added, bristling: “what? It’s weird. Does no-one else find it weird?”

“Now that you mention it –”

“You know, I couldn’t put my finger on what it was before, but–”

“Forget their lack of navel!” Fandral snapped, an impatient pedagogue fishing for the correct answer.

Volstagg stroked his abundant beard and ventured: “is it not more of a question of their being identical in every way?”

“The way they move,” said Tyr, stroking his chin. “As if in battle formation–”

“Precisely!” Fandral looked pleased that the conversation was finally going in the direction he wanted it to. “It is as if they regard themselves as a single entity, and not as individuals with hopes and _dreams_ and–”

“Get. To the point, Fandral,” Hogun grumbled, impatient to know exactly how much of his day was destined to be wasted.

“Well, is it not obvious? These... persons have have never had the chance to flourish on their own. They have lived their lives imprisoned in the dark. Yet this is ASGARD, the shining city – a new world of freedom and possibility! And who better to show them it than we? And Tyr?”

“You are proposing,” Sif stated, by way of clarification, “that each of us takes one of _them_ on an adventure?”

“Yes!” Fandral cried.

“No,” said everyone else (excepting Tyr, who just looked baffled).

“But think, _friendsandTyr_ , how much of a service we would be doing our lord Balder in teaching them independent ways.”

Sif frowned as she regarded Balder trying to fend off an offering of soused herring. “He does look pathetic.”

*~*~*

“Lord Balder, my liege,” Fandral announced as he led his party into the throne room, Volstagg inadvertently knocking aside a seneschal who had rushed forward to delay their entry. “We have come to grant you a boon!”

Balder looked up from the map he was poring over with a senior advisor to ascertain a province boundary and thereby settle a trade dispute. “Er... can it wait?”

“It is already overdue!”

“Ah, then perhaps if you make it quick–”

Fandral launched into a high-speed version of his pitch from earlier, emphasizing the parts about HOPES and DREAMS in a declamatory style that would have done one of the realm’s strolling players proud. Meanwhile, the clones looked on in leonine disdain from their lounging-spots.

When he had finished, Balder folded his hands on his lap and said: “thank-you, my loyal friends, but I really don’t think it’s a wise idea.”

“Not a wise idea?’ Fandral baulked.

“Ah, the Lokis don’t like to be differentiated. I find it makes them rather upset.”

Fandral dealt with this setback admirably. “Of course it makes them upset, that’s the _point_ , man! How will they ever overcome this dependency on one another – and on you– if you don’t let them learn to be individuals?”

Balder still shook his head. “They are but newly arrived. Perhaps in time they will feel safe enough here to venture separately, but for the time being I think they should be allowed to simply act as they are accustomed.” Balder shifted, eyes flicking nervously to the Loki perched on his armrest. “Insofar as that does not outrage our sense of propriety.”

Undaunted, and now in the stride of the debate, Fandral countered: “does it not occur to you that their ways are Latveria’s ways? _Doctor Doom_ ’s ways? And that in reenforcing their habits you are winking at all that tyrant’s faults?”

This appeared to hit home. Balder flushed deeply with shame. “I would never...”

“And yet you do! You allow them to think they are mere concubines, a nameless herd!”

“Fandral, enough!” Balder raised his hand. The clones were staring now, that knife blade-keen, dangerous look back in their eyes. “Enough, my friend,” he said in a more tempered tone. “I would have you bear in mind that they do understand your every word.”

“We would look after them,” Sif said, breaking the tension that followed. “I dare say you would finish your royal business more quickly without their hindrance.”

“Perhaps...” Balder ventured hesitantly. “Perhaps an hour or two...”

“Three!” Fandral insisted.

Balder sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Very well. But I can guarantee you that they won’t like it.”

Balder gave his instructions to the clones as carefully and firmly as he could, steeling himself against their panicked, beseeching looks and grabbing hands. Clearly they considered this another punishment for some unknown infraction or lapse on their parts.

“All will be well,” he said. “It is a short time you would otherwise spend in boredom here. Now each of you go with one of these trusty friends. I command it.”

There were tears shed at this. Balder had not felt such guilty pangs since encountering those he had slain during his sojourn in Hel.

“They only fuss so because you molly-coddle them, Balder,” Fandral tisked, shepherding one reluctant clone before him.

*~*~*

Fandral took his charge to the garden, where many of the castle’s ladies were spending the late morning in conversation and games, benignly watched over by Frigga (who kept one eye on her embroidery and the other on anyone Fandral went near who she deemed to be too young to know better). Fandral introduced the Loki clone to several of his female acquaintances before getting distracted by a particularly spirited flirtation and wandering off with the lady in question to the partial-seclusion of the hind-side of a rose trellis. The clone trailed about forlornly until he was abducted by a group of Asgardian adolescents, with but few centuries and little wisdom between them.

Sif took hers hunting, talking the whole while about the finer details of tracking and stealth. When the clone seemed unimpressed by this, constantly looking back the way they came, she told him they could return when they’d caught and killed something, and not a _moment_ sooner.

Volstagg took his Loki to the nearest tavern where he tried to induct him into Asgardian citizenship by teaching him to identify the different kinds of ales served therein.

Tyr took his to the sparring arena, where he attempted to give the Loki a lesson in swordplay. The clone would not hold the blade properly, letting it tip down onto the ground and regarding it with a sort of blank indifference. Tyr tried to conjure up some enthusiasm with lunges and feints, whereupon he accidentally nicked the fabric of the clone’s single garment.

Hogun took pity on his Loki, walking with him only so far as the hill that overlooked the castle, where they both sat and simply waited out the time. When the clone tugged his sleeve every quarter hour Hogun would open his eyes and take in the position of the sun before telling him how much time was left before their return.

*~*~*

A lapse of three hours found Balder staring angrily at his friends. “What did you _do_ to them? And where is Tyr?”

Four of the Lokis were huddled behind the throne, clinging to each other. Hogun’s clone appeared to be the only one who emerged unscathed from the experiment: Fandral’s had had his hair braided in a very ugly and unflattering style and was holding aloft his hands, the nails of which had been painted with rose-coloured lacquer; Volstagg’s was glassy-eyed and swaying slightly; Sif’s was covered in soil and wet leaves.

“I’m sure he’s coming...” said Fandral, glancing at the door with undisguised trepidation.

Balder folded his arms. “I’m still waiting for an explanation – Sif!”

“He...” the warrior-maiden’s eyes were wide and curiously unseeing, seeming to stare past Balder entirely. “He... broke its neck.”

Balder blinked at her. “What?”

“A young roe deer. He jumped on it, and broke its neck. With... with his bare hands,” she mimed the action with a savage jerk. “I can still hear the sound it made...” she lowered her head and shuddered.

“Sif, look at him – he’s practically a house-cat – now, I don’t know why you’re making this up but– Volstagg, is that one _drunk_?”

Volstagg was spared an explanation because at this moment Tyr entered with his charge. Tyr was holding a dressing to his ear (which seemed to be bleeding heavily) and one side of his ring-bound hair had been drastically lopped off.

The four clones gasped, their eyes widening in abject horror as they ran to their fifth, hands alternately reaching out to touch the tattered edge of his garment and hover over the long, shallow cut on his cheek.

As one, the five turned to look at the Asgardians, their gazes alighting on Fandral, Volstagg, Sif, Tyr, Hogun, and finally, Balder, in turn. With great dignity they turned their backs and set off towards the doorway, hands firmly clasped.

“I have some experience with this,” said Volstagg brightly when they were out of sight. “When my Hildegund is displeased I find it best to give her some time to allay her anger. Also, when you do come in the door, get ready to duck in case they have crockery to hand.”

“They are not my _wives_ , Volstagg,” said Balder.

“Of course not,” he agreed hurriedly.

Everyone made noises of assent and pretended to find the floor greatly interesting.

*~*~*

Balder finished his royal dealings some hours later, and as he made his way back to his chamber he realised he was dawdling. He entered furtively, feeling like an intruder upon his own rooms. The candles were burning to stubs, the fire left unattended. The clones stood in a loose semi-circle, one of them kneeling as he fixed up the hem of the Loki that stood before him.

They had all shortened their skirts so that where the delicate fabric had previously brushed their slippered feet, it now fell to just below the clones’ knees. As the four who were unoccupied turned their heads to look at him, Balder saw that they had all carved identical scratches into their left cheeks.

“I...” Balder’s words caught in his throat. The shame that coursed through him was even more intense than that he had felt earlier when he saw that in their desperation to undo what had been wrought upon them, they had mutilated themselves.

Just the previous day he had brooded over the motives behind their lovemaking, yet that was something they seemingly gave with readiness and joy. What he had done to them this day was a violation that caused them real distress, and he felt himself growing monstrous in their sight.

In his anxiety to make some kind of amends, Balder reached out to touch the nearest clone’s arm, but the Loki took a very deliberate step back to move beyond Balder’s reach, raising his chin in a haughty jerk. Balder tried to tell himself that the flash of red he saw in the clone’s eyes was just a trick of the low light.

He stepped back to give them space, raising his hands for a moment in placation.

“I know that you have been sorely wronged this day. All I ask is that you do not blame my friends for their parts in it. You must understand that they think that they do you a kindness in separating you. Here in Asgard, we are raised up from the cradle to believe that our individual actions have great weight and meaning – that we must prove ourselves, make a name for ourselves. My friends do not understand how you can be content to be indistinguishable, to share but one name. They do not bear you malice, it is simply beyond their comprehension.”

Balder clasped his hands together and took a deep breath, fighting the tremor in his voice as tears slipped down his cheeks. “It is _my_ fault. I should have known better than to abuse your loyalty by compelling you to act against your own wishes. I do not know why you treat me with such deference and affection, because it is far more than I deserve. I am a poor king to you, and a poor protector. I can only promise to try to be a better, and to make sure your dignity is never again impugned in such a fashion.”

He sank to his knees on the stone floor, removing his helmet and placing it by, at a loss how to display his contrition more. “I do not ask for your forgiveness... but I wish you to know that I am sorry. I am...”

As words failed him he simply sat there, dazed, wondering as he regarded them flickering and distorted by his swimming eyes, how he appeared to them. Whatever their conception of a true king was, it was most definitely not someone who unmanned himself in such a fashion.

He felt knees bumping his and suddenly a warm, lean body pressed up against him; arms twining about his shoulders and fingers teasing out his flattened, sweat-damp hair. One of the Lokis was in his lap – but only one. He wondered if this meant they were only one-fifth disposed towards forgiveness, but then there was darkness as more bodies and gentle, caressing hands crowded in upon him.

As velvety lips kissed at this tear-tracks he stroked the naked back of the one still perched on his thighs.

“How did you get to be so kind and good?” he asked, his tone softly wondering. He felt an amused exhalation and a mouth curling into a smile against this ear.

Perhaps, he thought, they were as contrary as their progenitor – Loki had been raised in bright Asgard only to become villainous; did it not stand to reason that these five, raised in darkness and barbarity, could become virtuous?

As they moved back and gave him room to stand, Balder regarded their sadly-reduced state with a pained expression.

“You shall have more cloth,” he said resolutely. “The finest spun in all the nine realms. Must it be silver?”

They shared a glance and shook their heads.

“But that is your favourite colour, is it not?”

They nodded.

Balder resolved to send word to the dwarven merchants in the morning. And perhaps he would enquire about jewelry – silver, of course.

*~*~*

“I cannot help but observe,” said Frigga at dinner, “that they seem to be wearing _less_ clothing than previously.”

“Ah,” Balder reddened. “Yes.”

“Is this a trend?” she raised a tapered pale eyebrow. “Should I expect, in time, for them to be wandering about the halls entirely nude?”

Balder blushed, but was saved from replying by one of the clones pushing a morsel of chicken against his lips.

*~*~*

Loki Laufeyson was lurking, as was his wont. He had always found eavesdropping to be the most efficient way to gather information – the taverns were full of drink-loosened lips, and hearsay was seldom ungrounded.

On this occasion he was not invisible, but making use of a subtler kind of concealment: the tavern’s occupants were aware of the presence of a man in the ingle nook, but they felt no desire to pay him any mind or look directly at him. Loki sipped his wine and bent his ear to the conversation of two unremarkable Asgardians of the artisan-class who sat at the nearest table, taking deep draughts from foaming tankards.

“Eh, Brodd, you should watch yourself if you’re going to the castle. You’re not in the provinces now and there’s dark deeds afoot up there.”

The one called Brodd blew through his lips like a horse to dismiss his friend’s words. “You always say that, Alrik. What new danger is it you have dreamed up?”

“It is no dream! I had it from Ingerda who is wife to my eldest, she’s a scullery maid there. The servants are all put to fright by a new plague that is come upon them all.”

“A plague, you say?”

“Aye. There are five wicked sorcerers fetched up there, and they have bewitched the mind of our good prince Balder.”

“Where came they from?”

“Midgard, from that very land we were once forced to shelter in when the elder Odinson was in exile.”

“Lackverita, or something of the sort.”

“Aye, that was the name,” the one called Alrik nodded sagely.

“And is it sure they are wicked – how prove you that?”

“A Valkyrie who insulted them met with an evil fate. On her way from the gates her horse suddenly reared and cast her into a ditch, and with all the rain of late – it is said she was almost drowned!”

Brodd seemed unconvinced. “Mayhap she was drunk. Or the horse was spooked by something in the common way – a dog or a gust of wind.”

Alrik gave his companion a worldly-wise, supercilious look as he slurped his ale. “Well may you think that – I have not told you the worst of it.”

“Go on then, man, don’t draw it out!”

Alrik leaned in and lowered his voice. “They are the very image of the trickster god – the liesmith Laufeyson. As like to him as I to myself.”

Loki choked on a mouthful of wine and spat it across the table.

*~*~*

Balder lay back among the rumpled covers with an arm behind his head. It was a feast day, and so he had no royal audiences to hold. Instead, he had spent a relaxing morning in his own chambers with his five companions. They had already breakfasted and bathed (although he had a feeling they would need to repeat this second act before joining the festivities).

There were two clones on the bed with him, one with his head on Balder’s chest as Balder rubbed circles on the small of his back with his fingertips; the other was more than half asleep, sprawled on his front with an arm hanging off the mattress.

Balder watched the other three through half-lidded eyes as they busied themselves in the spot of brightest sunlight cast by the high window. Bolts of cloth lay stacked near them. One clone was busily snipping a length of silk with shears, working from a pattern that existed within his own mind; the second was pinning a prototype garment onto the third, who stood very upright and still, acting as their model.

Balder marveled at this – the five Lokis usually swapped and interchanged as they went about a task, like cards in a relentlessly-shuffled deck. He thought perhaps their willingness to let him see them staying relatively still was a new gesture of trust.

It also occurred to him that the quality of their seductions had subtly changed – not in enthusiasm or frequency, but in manner. They were less hard-edged and forceful now, and more playful – perhaps reassured that Balder desired them and was not about to send them away.

They were more than he could ask for, he told himself, yet Balder still found he craved reciprocity. The clones undoubtedly received enjoyment in being taken by him, and in pleasuring him with their hands and mouths (sometimes over and over by turns, making a game of it until he could only tremble in their grip and shudder through dry orgasms) – this much was obvious from their own panted breaths and climaxes. Yet Balder could not escape the suspicion that they had been trained to think of themselves as vessels for another’s desires, and as instruments of his (Doom’s – Balder thought, feeling queasy for a moment) dominance.

Balder wondered if there was a way to coax them out of their learned patterns without somehow offending them.

(Of course, it was also entirely possible that it was simply their own erotic preference to be the ones penetrated and used. Given that – if rumors were to be believed – the original Loki had more than once allowed himself to be impregnated, perhaps the inclination was innate?)

He supposed there was no way around this conundrum but to ask.

He shifted and the clone pressed against him obligingly raised his head and pressed their mouths together in a sleepy kiss. “There is...” Balder began, regarding him seriously, “I would like to ask...”

At the sound of Balder’s voice, the second clone promptly woke up and rolled over. The increased scrutiny made Balder falter, his words coming out in an uncoordinated rush: “would you like to take me? It is, ah, something I have enjoyed, with other lovers – _former_ lovers – and I thought you might – unless you would feel uncomfortable?”

The two clones on the bed blinked at him, then at each other, then swiveled their heads to look at their industrious fellows beyond the bed. Balder realised that he had begun to be able to tell how alarmed or nonplussed they were by any given suggestion based on the duration of the mutual staring. He wondered if they ever argued during these time lapses. If they _had_ an equivalent to arguing... or, for that matter, jealousy. He thought they probably didn’t experience the latter – given that they knew no-one could tell them apart, to love one of them was surely to love all.

For some reason, he was still talking: “you could use your fingers, if you prefer. If none of you want to actually, you know. I just thought you should know that I _do_ like it. Very much.”

More staring. At him again, then each other.

“... I, it’s a fantasy, I suppose – I was always monogamous, _before_ , but I have thought about being in the middle of two men. To take one and in turn be taken.”

Oh, no – were they actually shocked? Had he scandalized Doctor Doom’s sex slaves?

He made to sit up but the nearest clone pushed him back onto the bed, quite firmly, holding up one finger to tell him to wait. In another brief moment the Lokis on the floor had put down their work and were clambering naked onto the bed. That avid look that came into their eyes as they crawled over the bed to him was now enough to make him instantly hard in anticipation.

As they kissed and caressed him he wondered if he would ever take this for granted – the touch of so many skilled hands upon his body. Would sex with just one partner now always seem somehow... lacking?

One clone was still draped over his chest, kissing him with great focus. Directly behind this one a second was having oil poured into his hands from an amphora, and he instantly set to work easing the first one open with his long, agile fingers. Balder could feel the hitches of breath this provoked against his mouth.

It was Balder’s turn to gasp when a hot and knowing mouth engulfed his prick. The clone lying level with Balder’s waist sucked him in a slow, almost lazy rhythm that was clearly designed to tease him, not to make him come. Balder reached down to tangle fingers in this one’s hair, caressing the back of his neck and breaking the kiss with the first Loki for a moment to tell him exactly how good he was.

The clone pleasuring him pulled off, licking his lips quickly, before another swooped in and sealed their mouths together. Balder felt that sharp twist of arousal in the pit of his stomach as he watched the two kiss each other in their perfect symmetry. A part of him still said _wrong_ , wanting to label them as brothers – for all that would make them a less eerie phenomenon – but in truth what they did was probably much closer to self-stimulation than it was to incest.

The one who had been thoroughly prepared straddled Balder’s hips and reached back to grip hold of his shaft, guiding it inside himself as he angled his hips and sank down, his near translucent eyelids fluttering. Balder arched his spine and pressed in deeper, moaning brokenly.

Well, if this was their way of telling him to shut up and accept the status quo, Balder could live with that.

He glanced away from the spectacle of the Loki riding him, with his long, elegant hands pressing down on Balder’s chest. To Balder’s left another clone was preparing a third – he watched the oiled fingers twisting, the wet mouth opening in a shuddering, silent moan and he _wanted_ –

The clone on top of him was moving in a harsh rhythm now; one of the others wrapped his long arms around him to help his fellow balance, pulling him aside when he had ridden and shuddered through climax. Their machine-like coordination was never more unsettling than in bed, Balder thought, as he was gently but insistently rolled on top of the second in line to be taken.

There were more hands on him, worshiping his skin in long strokes, and the clone beneath him hooked a pale leg over Balder’s shoulder in clear invitation.

“Am I to do all the work for you?” he asked playfully as he breached this second, who simply pushed back and bit at his neck by way of response.

Their collective hands still roved over his body, but one had become daring, slipping between Balder’s cheeks to brush lightly over his hole, then – maddeningly – darting away as if startled.

“Whichever of you just did that,” Balder bit out, using most of his concentration to please the clone beneath him, “by all means, continue.”

No more coaxing was needed: oil-slippery fingers were pushing into him, and it was all Balder could do to hold back his own climax as the more fortunate clone below spent himself (in moments like this Balder often reflected that five against one really wasn’t _fair_ ). As a third Loki slipped into the second’s place beneath him, canting his hips up to take Balder inside him, the welcome thrusting fingers withdrew. Balder looked back over his shoulder to find that the two clones kneeling behind (lower left and right of him) had their eyebrows drawn together in vague consternation; one was worrying his lower lip.

“Would at least one of you please fuck me?” somewhere in his distracted mind, Balder spared a thought to hope that they knew the difference between a command and a very ardent wish.

Balder almost fell onto the clone below him as he was rocked into from behind. The rhythm was a little unsure to begin with, but Balder moaned appreciatively at the heat and slickness and tight, coiling pressure that he had been craving. After a moment it clicked, and he was caught in just the right rhythm of push and pull. He felt, very clearly, that he was theirs – surrounded and enclosed, and touched _everywhere_.

When the Loki who took him spent himself inside Balder it was hot, messy and exquisite, he glanced back to see them wild-eyed, not at all as seductive and put together as usual.

“It’s alright, it’s perfect, here–” he coaxed another to fill him again, feeling seed drip down his inner thighs. “Yes, yes, just like that–”

He didn’t last much longer, but gained a small satisfaction managing to get the clone beneath him to orgasm bare seconds before he himself succumbed. Balder was little more than a boneless, over-sensitized puddle by this point; their many hands holding him up and spreading Balder’s legs wide for the last of them to finish fucking what little remained of his wits out of him.

They ended up in a very sweaty and sticky pile, the five clones seemingly still a little stunned by this unforeseen variation on their lovemaking.

(Balder took some satisfaction in that, then felt bad about it.)

They soon came back to their usual animated selves when he suggested another bath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fanart for this chapter by kaitou_taco: [Sif and the Wankers Three](http://tacitoz.tumblr.com/post/7008274488/inspired-by-this-fic-ld-i-just-cant-get-rid-of).


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> By [](http://hummingbirdmoth.livejournal.com/profile)[**hummingbirdmoth**](http://hummingbirdmoth.livejournal.com/)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The 'water counteracts Loki's magic' thing is actually canon, believe it or not. One of the earliest comics has Thor tossing him into a river and then having to save him from drowning. 

In the end, it was lucky for everyone that Thor returned to Asgard on the same day Loki did.

0

“They seem to have adapted well to their new lives,” said the Odinson, pleased.

As the festivities wound down, the evening was spent by the side of the river. Children ran about on the banks, dressed up in masks and colourful costumes by their parents, and happy couples reclined beneath the olive trees, picnicking on salads and cold cuts of meat as the sunset melted into a soft purple. Ale flowed liberally, and fireworks lit the sky.

Balder lay back on the grass, enjoying the opportunity to mingle amongst Asgard as though he were surrounded by friends and not subjects. Rules of pomp and proprietary were relaxed on such days, so he felt entitled to bring the clones out into the open, that all Asgard might see them and see that they were not the uncanny horrors that rumour had made them out to be.

He had been teaching them to fish.

“Very well,” he agreed, as one plunged his hand below the water and neatly seized a wriggling trout, while two tried to work out how to best use the net he had given them. One was making a fire upon which to cook their catch, and the fifth curled at his side and flicked away any ants that crawled up his legs. The disruption to their routine did not seem to concern any of them half as much as Fandral’s impromptu day out had, and Balder was certain that it was because they were able to do it together.

He had begun to notice in them a deep and voracious appetite for knowledge, any knowledge, however obscure. Earlier, he had taught them how to encourage wild birds to eat straight from their palms, and they had sat in a circle, listening, with deep and obvious concentration.

It was an idyllic evening, and the arrival of his best friend only served to complete Balder’s sense of satisfaction. Thor had returned to partake in the festivities, and sat beside him with his helmet resting on his knee.

Thor smiled at him. “I had worried that I was leaving you with an unfair burden,” he said, gesturing to one of the five. “But you seem happier than I have seen you in many centuries, Balder.”

”They are good for me,” Balder said. “I think- I hope- that I am good for them, too.”

It was true. How long had it been since anyone last spoiled him so- comforted him when he suffered the derision of his detractors, tended to his headaches and backaches with warm sponges and lingering massages? After the morning’s frivolities, they had laid him flat on a wooden table and one of them had hopped up and begun walking on his back, toes digging in and rounded heels making small circles up his vertebrae. It had felt marvelllous.

He was idly wondering if he should trot back up to the palace to retrieve his lyre, that he might play a while for them before the sun went down, when a hush fell over the revelry.

Balder suspected he knew what it was before he turned his head, and he was right.

A tall figure stood on the other side of the river, his shadow made long by the dropping sun. Balder could not make out the silhouette’s features, but the horned helm was unmistakable.

And he was watching the clones.

Thor winced, and moved to stand. “Brother…”

With a shimmer, Loki’s image disappeared from the opposing bank, and reappeared not twenty paces from where the fifth clone sat, frying fish.

Lines, Balder thought. That was it. He’d been wondering why he hadn’t been more deeply disturbed to be… courting? Seduced by? Either way, making love to people who bore the features of one of his oldest enemies should surely be more innately unsettling than it was. But there it was, now he had the two side by side to compare; they weren’t exactly identical. For while Loki, however perfectly he may wear the mask of civility, had faint frown lines etched into his brow, faint crinkles beneath his eyes, faint mementos of a hundred vicious smiles etched onto his cheeks, the clones had skin as smooth as blank paper.

How to explain this, Balder wondered? ‘Hail, Liesmith, these are your duplicates, created to fulfil your erstwhile ally’s every sexual need and for whom I have developed an inappropriate fondness. Join us, that all Asgard may wonder yet further at the perversity of Balder’s appetites.’

“Hail, my lords,” Loki said. “What are those?”

Thor, may his line name live long and his line increase, averted catastrophe for a few seconds by charging up to this brother like a bull and seizing him up in a mighty bear hug; at the same time, keeping the trickster’s arms locked at his sides, thus averting the potential for fire balls.

Seizing the moment, Balder turned and spoke sternly to the clones, although not so loud that those gathered near could overhear him. “All five of you, return to the palace immediately. Wait for me in my… our rooms, I shall come by you shortly.”

To order them like servants felt wrong, but they nodded, and departed as one, casting curious glances back in Loki’s direction.

While Thor continued his crushing embrace, Loki had not once looked away from them.

“But how splendid to see you back home, and on a festival day too!” Thor continued when they were out of sight, releasing him with a hearty clap on the back and far too much false cheer. “Let us get some meat into you, you’re skin and bone! Come, come…”

“They have no navels,” said Loki, to himself, in a trance-like voice. “How strange. I wonder why-…?”

“EXCELLENT question, and there are MANY EXPLANATIONS to be had,” said Thor, locking an arm around his shoulder and drawing him away from the crowd. “Let us walk together, brother, I have much news for you, and I would hear all you have to tell me of your journeys.”

Unresisting, Loki was coaxed away, still mumbling to himself, “But why wouldn’t they have navels?”

0

Later, as Thor poured his brother his twelfth cup of wine, he noticed that his hands were still shaking. He had asked surprisingly few questions, which was worrying in itself. What few he did utter, Thor deflected with vague answers, neglecting entirely to mention the clones’ fondness for Balder, or Balder’s fondness for them.

With the aid of alcohol, Thor managed to put off the inevitable until the following morning, when Loki shook off the hangover before he did, and made his way directly to the erstwhile ruler of Asgard.

“I would speak with Balder,” Loki said, haughtily.

Fandral stood before the doors to the throne room, his arms outstretched. Volstagg and Hogun stood behind him.

“That’s not really possible,” said Fandral.

“He’s busy,” said Volstagg.

“With matters of state,” said Hogun.

“I am a matter of state,” said Loki, curtly, “and YOU are states of matter unless you get out of. My. Way. Now.”

“I do wish you had stayed away,” said Fandral, reaching for his sword. “Things were so much nicer.”

The confrontation was interrupted by a distinct, unmistakeable groan from inside the throne room. Loki cocked an ear.

“What is this? Is dear King Balder ill?”

”Yes!” Volstagg choked. “Terribly! On his last legs!”

“It’s infectious,” grunted Hogun. “You should depart with all speed.”

Loki was unconvinced. “He looked perfectly well when I saw him yesterday.”

To himself, he thought; but he has been in the company of five THINGS with my baser instincts for many days now. What if one has been steadily poisoning him? By Bor, what if they ALL have?

“It came on suddenly,” said Fandral, realising he was losing ground as Loki’s eyes narrowed at another deep, throaty moan. “A rare bout of, er…”

”Gangrene,” said Volstagg.

“Salmonella,” said Hogun.

“Salmonella, which has LEAD to gangrene,” said Fandral, and made a despairing noise deep in his throat as Loki became intangible and slipped past him.

“And have you already sent the court physicians to plague him?” the trickster asked, pulling wide the doors. “A wonder he is still alive at all.”

He strode in.

“We didn’t handle that well,” said Hogun.

“Come on,” said Fandral, resignedly. “This was going to happen sooner or later. We’d best be on standby to clean up the mess.”

They followed him into the throne room, where a ghastly tableau greeted their eyes.

Balder sat on the throne, his eyes wide and swimming with guilt. One clone sat on either knee; one stood to the side, fanning him with an ostrich feather. One leaned over the top of the throne, dribbling honey onto his chest. And one knelt between his legs, his slender back obscuring exactly what he was doing to the king of Asgard, but the redness of his lips as he turned his head to see who had come in gave the game away.

Loki had stopped midstride, one foot still hovering an inch from the ground. 

“Ah,” said Balder. “Ah.”

Volstagg craned his neck. “I realise this is hardly the right moment but he’s very well endowed, isn’t he?”

“Unusually,” agreed Hogun. “Don’t look so upset, Fandral, it’s not a competition.”

For Balder’s part, he found it strange to watch Loki’s face twist in anger. The emotion didn’t fit the faces that had cuddled beside him in bed last night, and tickled him in the morning.

“THIS is what you do with them, bright and noble Balder?” Loki hissed, as the air surrounding him became superheated.

The clones regarded him passively. Draped around Balder, they looked, Loki thought, like so many stupid sheep doting on a young shepherd girl from one of Mother’s revolting saccharine nursery rhymes. Their black hair (his hair) was slick with sweat; their green eyes (his eyes, HIS, no one in Asgard had green eyes but him, NO ONE) were round and unafraid.

He felt all the saliva in his mouth evaporate and was remotely aware that marble tiles were melting beneath his feet. Look at them. So sweetly arranged over Balder’s lap and legs. So agreeable. Was this what Balder would have liked from Loki, mayhap? All those years of disregard, of REJECTION, would it all have been averted if he had put his head in Balder’s lap and purred like some stupid house PET?

Loki knew his thoughts were becoming irrational, but he could not stop them. Would Father or THOR have liked him more like this, with wide, innocent eyes and sweetly sloping shoulders, pliant and tender and….

Everything within ten metres of him was scorching, but he felt very cold.

His view of them was obscured as by Balder’s cape as the king strode to the fore. His sword had not been drawn; he knew well how useless swords were in the face of Loki’s talents.

“Enough, Laufeyson,” said Balder. “Your quarrel is with me.”

He was wearing nothing but the cape, having been divested of all other articles of clothing ten seconds after shutting the door, and the fact that Loki did not even glance down indicated just how infuriated he was.

“They… the clones were created by Doom. I believe he employed them for… that is, he forced them to perform acts of a sexual nature.”

 

“So you thought the best possible thing to do was have sex with them,” Loki growled. “With beings wearing MY form.”

Damn. The worst of it was that Balder wasn’t entirely certain that Loki wasn’t making a good point. “No, I… I didn’t ask them to, I tried to persuade them not to, but…”

His lack of consent was clearly of no consequence to Loki, from whose nostrils and from between whose clenched teeth thin threads of smoke began to emerge, making him look markedly sinister. His hands were now engulfed in balls of green fire, which grew to the size of melons, then cartwheels. Feeling the hair on his chest begin to singe and burn off, Balder stood his ground. For all things, there was a reckoning.

His last regret was that the clones were watching, and would be distraught to see him reduced to a fine cloud of ashes. Maybe when he was gone and the throne had fallen to Frigga, they would forget about him entirely in the haste to dote upon their new queen.

“HOLD!”

Thunder cracked as Thor pushed his way past the Warriors Three, until he stood before Balder and the clustered clones, facing down his brother.

The onlookers were caught between dread at the potential destruction that would be unleashed if the sons of Odin gave themselves to battle there and then, and a desire to bear witness to another of Thor and Loki’s relatively rare instances of open combat.

“Direct your rage at me; I was the one who brought them here,” Thor said. “They have committed no crime, unlike yourself. And they have suffered gross indignities at the hands of one of YOUR erstwhile comrades. As for your argument that Balder has made use of your form against your will, there may be something to that. But I would point out that, as Sif will attest, body-snatching is not an area in which you yourself can claim total innocence. Stand DOWN, Loki.”

Loki still looked furious, but the room was getting cooler.

“You brought them here,” he repeated, his teeth clenched.

“What else would you have had me do with them?” Thor asked in irritation.

“KILL THEM!” Loki yelled, as though it were obvious. “Call upon the power of Mjolnir and rip them apart at the atomic level! They are ABOMINATIONS!”

“No, they’re not!” Fandral looked embarrassed. “Well, mine wasn’t. He’s sort of useless, really.”

“Mine threw up after three glasses,” Volstagg imparted. “Not very abominable at all.”

“Mine doesn’t know how maps work. It’s true,” Hogun grunted as they turned his way. “I drew him a map of Asgard in the dirt. Couldn’t get his head around it. Their brains are odd. As Volstagg said, they’re hardly the stuff of nightmares.”

“What is WRONG with you people?!” Loki screamed, clutching at his head in frustration. "LOOK AT THEM!" 

As they argued, Balder felt a touch on his back. One of the clones was offering out his pants, and another his shirt, and another gestured with his head towards the small door behind the throne.

They clearly found no shame in allegiance to a king who fled from battle, he thought, as they quickly took him by the wrists and ushered him away before the squabbling ceased.

0

Mother was not helpful.

She did, however, offer to comb his hair, which was always good for his nerves.

“You see only the ways in which they are unlike you,” she said, as he lay on his side with his head in her lap, a throwing dagger hanging loosely from one palm, ready to kill anyone who chanced upon them like this. “Everyone else sees only the ways in which they are like you.”

“It is obscene,” he scowled. “And more, it is immoral. I would have expected better from Balder the Good.”

“You are hardly in a position to preach morality, my darling,” Frigga said, drawing back a lock of hair behind his ear. “If they were clones of Thor, or clones of Fandral, you’d find the whole thing funny.”

0

When next he came upon them, it was midnight and he was alone.

Rage had given way to revulsion, which was beginning to give way to melancholia, and he was drifting about the corridors, trailing his fingertips over the mosaics on the wall, idly hoping to encounter Thor that they might drink together again.

It didn’t have to be Thor. Anyone with a large supply of wine would do. Hela would do, provided she had wine.

One clone strolled out from behind a nearby pillar- a tactic he recognised, for he had so often employed it himself. Two appeared on his right and left. He didn’t need to turn to know that two more were behind him.

They were Doom’s creations, and dangerous, but the spirit of scientific curiosity had to be satisfied. He let them come closer, sniffing as one drew near, filtering all the knowledge he could from the air. “You’re very young,” he said, “predictably. You have… hmm, no magic, but… what DID Victor do to you? And, let me see, immortal, yes… and there really is no way of telling you apart, is there? You’re not one mind in five bodies, you’re five minds… five entirely identical minds. Extraordinary.”

He sniffed once more, and let out a sharp laugh. “And barren! Poor things, each of you as sterile as geldings! Another of Victor's precautions, I assume.”

That allayed some of his worst fears, at least.

He had no concern that they might harm him, not without any magical skill, but the way they surrounded him in total silence was eerie. Against his will, the sight of their hairless chests and knobbly knees identical to his own brought to mind the sight of Balder submerged beneath the near-naked weight of them, and he hardened.

“The best thing to do would be to kill you,” he observed, as one leaned closer, nose almost touching his neck. But he didn’t, not yet; he wanted to see what they would do.

Belatedly, he realised that they weren’t looking at HIM, as they inched closer and closer, tightening the circle. They were looking at his helmet.

And then they lunged…

0

 

He came to a few moments later. Suspended by his feet from the ceiling, an apple stuffed into his mouth.

He spat it out, and said to himself, “Now, how did they manage that without any magical prowess, I wonder…”

He was wet. Ah. The two behind him must have been carrying buckets. It was a little known fact that Loki’s offensive magic operated in extremes; to freeze a man’s blood came as naturally to him as burning enemies alive with his mind. Water, a middling substance, negated most of his more powerful offensive spells, and the clones had known.

Doom had probably told them, he thought, cutting himself down with a small knife.

  
Then he realised what was missing.

0

Balder was awoken by the entire excited pack of them, bounding on the bed and tugging at him.

When he had rubbed sleep from his eyes, they held their prize out for him, proudly.

It was a helmet.

Loki’s helmet.

“Oh, merciful Bestla…” said Balder, as a howl of rage ripped through the foundations of the palace.

Thor appeared in his doorway shortly.

“My brother has asked that your flock return what is his,” he said, tightly, glancing over his shoulder. Shouting was heard down the corridor leading up to the king’s suite.

“Has he?” Balder said in astonishment.

“No, what he actually asked was that I lift up Mjolnir so that he may slay you all,” said Thor, as another scream followed, accompanied by a small explosion. “Give me the helmet and I will try to reason with him.”

0

The final straw came the next day, when Loki walked out from his spell room rubbing the bruise on his chest, and a wicker basket fell on his head with a squishy sound.

He lifted it off, and found himself covered in soft, wet red things. Upon inspection, they proved to be horse wombs.

“Childish,” he said as he plucked one off, for the benefit of the flash of silver he had just seen disappearing round the corner.

0

“I am leaving,” said Loki.

“I am saddened to hear it,” said Thor.

“You didn’t even try to make that sound convincing.”

“For what it is worth, I am sorry.”

And that was enough to slow his gait. Thor issued apologies as frequently as Odin did.

“Not sorry that I brought them here,” said Thor, “for they have brought Balder joy and I cannot but believe they are happier in Asgard than they were in Latveria. I am sorry that Doom violated your genetic code to make them; I am sorry that their existence offends you. We have quarrelled many times, and will continue to quarrel, but I would have you know that in THIS instance, I believe your fury to be just. No man should have to see his likeness warped so.”

His left arm wrapped around Loki’s chest, and he rested his forehead against his brother’s skull, a gesture of apology more significant than any of his words.

His right arm, the one which held Mjolnir, brought the hammer up until it was level with Loki’s eyeline. “If, however,” Thor continued, softly, “I ever discover exactly how Doom was able to obtain a sample of your DNA, and what exactly DID happen in Latveria all those years ago…”

He tapped the hammer against Loki’s skull, soft as though he were tapping an eggshell.

“You could have lingered longer on the part where you considered me righteous and just,” said Loki, leaning back into his brother’s arms. “I enjoyed that part.”

“I am sure. When you next return, I will ensure that Balder keeps their antics out of the throne room.”

“’When next I return.’ I am NEVER returning, you presumptuous buffoon.”

“My clever brother, do you honestly expect me to believe a lie you have told me at least a hundred times by now?”

0

They arrived to bid him farewell, as he thought they might. As he was approaching the waterfall that hid a portal that served as one of his many secret entrances into Asgard, they stepped out from behind the trees as one. Holding hands- was that a sign of insecurity, he wondered?

Standing in a row, they held out their arms, the blue veins of their wrists exposed, their hands curled into fists. Words written in black ink (in HIS handwriting) stood up starkly on their (HIS) white flesh.

One the skin of the first he read; **THE KING BELONGS TO US NOW. YOU HAD YOUR CHANCE. WE DON’T EVER WANT TO**

On the second he read; **SEE YOU HERE AGAIN. WE ARE MORE THAN ENOUGH TO KEEP BALDER SAFE AND**

On the third; **SATISFIED. BALDER THINKS WE ARE KIND AND GOOD. BUT YOU ARE**

And on the fourth; **US AND WE ARE YOU AND YOU KNOW WHAT YOU REALLY ARE. WE ARE**

And on the fifth; **CUNNING AND WE ARE TRUSTED. DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE US FOR**

When he had finished reading, they uncurled their fists and held up one hand each. In the centre of each palm were more words.

 **WE CAN,** read the first one.

 **HURT** , read the second.

 **YOU AND,** read the third.

 **WE,** read the fourth.

 **WILL** , read the fifth.

Then they all smiled, five sets of lips drawing back in unison, five sets of teeth flashing at him.

Perhaps, thought Loki as he slipped away through the waterfall and felt his mass begin to fly across the universe, it would be best to seek out warmer climes for a while.

He could kill them. He could.

He was almost entirely certain of it.

Just not quite willing to test that theory yet.

0

They could not teleport, and the journey back took two hours, in addition to the two hours it had taken them to get to the waterfall. They had to spend yet more time washing the ink off, and were late for dinner.

“Where have you been?” Balder asked when they returned to the castle. He had had the opportunity to feed himself for the first time in weeks, but worry had killed his appetite. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere.”

Good grief, he sounded like their mother, he thought.

“Not that I’m not glad that you’re finally venturing out of the palace on your own,” he added hastily. “I’m very much relieved, in fact. But do be sure to let me know where you are going next time, won’t you? I’m sure you can take care of yourselves, and there are many wondrous things in Asgard you should see. But there are also a few who would do you harm if they saw you. You must be careful.”

He didn’t mention the terrified fit he’d thrown in the hours they’d been gone, setting half the guards on a wild search.

They each bobbed up and down in a miniature bow, and one of them held up five fat salmon.

“You fished!” said Balder. “Well done!”

They nodded. They had fished.

“I suppose it took you so long because you weren’t used to it. But do not let that discourage you, you will improve quickly, I’m sure. When I first tried, I couldn’t catch anything for days.”

Catching the five salmon had taken them exactly two minutes each, but there was no need for the king to know that.

“For a while I was frightened you were tormenting Loki again,” he said as he led them inside. “I don’t need to tell you how dangerous that is. Now that you’re here, I shall see if I can’t have the cooks arrange a late supper…”

Two placed hands on his back, two went before him and opened the doors, and one walked behind, keeping a red-tinted eye on the horizon and the setting sun, until the doors swung shut behind him. 


	5. Chapter 5

They seemed to have fallen into a rhythm which if not, exactly, predictable (and certainly not boring), was comfortable. Balder woke to shifting bodies, questing hands and kisses and fell asleep to soft breathing upon his skin. During the day the five Lokis attended him in the throne room, and Balder found that his interviews were much shorter now that whoever petitioned him had to bear the weight of their green-eyed scrutiny.

The clones themselves had adapted to their new environment while retaining many of their own foibles and habits – they still followed Balder, but did not cling; they had a larger wardrobe, but all of variations on the same skirt-garment; they travelled abroad in the halls and gardens with more confidence, although it seemed they had no interest in socializing with anyone but Balder.

One curious thing was that when the dwarven merchants delivered the jewelry he had ordered for them, they were not the decorative torcs he had specified, but a set of silver rings, each inset with a cluster of five emeralds.

The dwarves were deeply affronted by his suggestion they might have made an error. The handwriting on the letter of commission they produced _looked_ like his, to be sure, and so Balder decided not to dispute it further. This proved to be entirely the right decision: brilliant smiles graced the faces of his companions when they tried them on and the rings fitted perfectly.

This, incidentally, was the moment Balder told the Lokis that he loved them for the first time. It felt like a particularly foolhardy thing to say (as they could hardly murmur it in return), but the words burbled forth without his consent when he was trying to say something more cautious and carefully nuanced (such as how he cared about them and their happiness).

He noted that they seemed pleased, but not surprised. They kissed him and stroked his head with their newly-adorned hands as if to reward him.

Then, the lull of their not-quite routine was interrupted one evening as they sat finishing dinner. The general hubbub of conversation died away at the sound of a horn flourish and the resounding voice of the royal messenger.

“He has awakened! Odin Allfather is among us once more!”

The hall erupted into hearty cheers as many battle-hardened hands thumped rhythmically on tables. The clones looked at each other and then at Balder. He couldn’t always read their expressions with accuracy, but this one was clarion-clear: dismay.

*~*~*

They didn’t understand. Balder had explained the Odinsleep and the terms of his stewardship and the circumstances of his discovering his royal heritage – but still they gazed at him with confused, anxious eyes.

They cried inconsolably. He had reassured them that he would find them occupations, and that they could accompany him as he went about his princely duties – playing ambassador and ensuring the safety of their borders. He told them things would be _better_ , even, because he would have more leisure time to spend with them – but his explanations were of no avail.

Sif and the Warriors Three had to hold the clones back during Odin’s reinstatement ceremony – they would have followed Balder up the aisle to the throne, tugging at his sleeves to dissuade him from giving up the golden crown he carried before him.

He sought them immediately afterwards, hoping to soothe them and stroke their tear-streaked faces, but they had disappeared. He went to their shared rooms but those too were empty. As a final thought struck him he went to the rooms that had first been earmarked for their use – and there they were, gathered in a listless semicircle and gazing out the window at the darkening horizon. Balder could not help but think that it was a worrisome sign that they no longer seemed to think of his rooms as their own.

“I know you are confused and angry,” he began, “but in time–”

As one they turned their backs to him, clasping hands resolutely. He could see betrayal flashing in their eyes as they turned their profiles to the wall.

Frustration made Balder clench his fists by his sides. “Cannot you see that this is not my doing? Odin is the rightful king, and though I am his son, I have never pretended to be more than a steward.”

Balder removed his helm and rested it against his hip, running his free hand through his hair as the thought how best to explain himself. “Asgard matters to me. Its towers and mountains, its winding streams, but most of all, its people – rough and strange as they must seem to you. Kingship was a great honour, and one which I will take upon me again if needed. But jewels and crowns, sitting on high – these things do not matter and it would take one more foolish than I to think that they do.”

They remained resolute in their shunning of him. He contemplated their naked backs and reflected that he had never seen them stand so upright and tense – all their natural languor seemed to have evaporated.

“Do you think less of me?” he asked, throat tightening, “I am the same man that I was. My loyalty and devotion are not diminished. I... I would be your lover still, if you would but have me. But if... if you cannot countenance that, I hope you will allow me to be your friend.”

They made no movement in response to his plea and Balder’s heart sank like a stone. Then a terrible thought occurred to him: “at least... at least reassure me that you were fond of me while it lasted. I cannot bear to think that I was no different to Doom. That one master is no better than another in your eyes and all your solicitude and affection merely feigned. Just... give me a look to tell me that this is not so.”

Their backs were a blank wall. Not a muscle twitched.

“Very well,” Balder said, soft and final. “Go freely from me then, and in peace.”

At the doorway he breathed deeply and gave a final glance back. “Know that Asgard is your home as long as you want it to be. If you will not be my lovers, or my friends, at least let me think of you as my countrymen.”

This provoked no more of a reaction than anything else he had said since entering.

*~*~*

The following day, Balder was trying to persuade himself that there were benefits to his being _persona non grata_ with the Lokis by indulging in some solitary reading when his half-hearted attempt to make sense of the paragraph he was now casting his eye over a third time was interrupted by rapid footsteps and a door slamming off the wall.

“Balder, come quickly!” cried a pale-looking Fandral. “I think one of your flock is dead.”

“Where?” a cold, heavy weight settled in Balder’s stomach, and with a lurch he was up out of his chair, shoving Fandral out the door in front of him. “Show me!”

They were both breathless and sweating when they arrived on the hilltop overlooking the city walls. One of the Lokis was splayed face-down on the grass. The attitude in which he lay was not half so eerie as the fact that he was _alone_ – Balder felt certain that only a catastrophe could have made the clones part ways. Had all five met with some ghastly fate? Had the original Loki returned in secret to work terrible vengeance against them for stealing (as he saw it) his form?

“Hogun,” Balder roared as he strode closer, “are you _poking him with a stick_?! Show some respect.”

Hogun blanched and hid the branch behind his back.

Balder dropped to his knees and tentatively reached out his hand to brush back the clone’s hair from his face. His body was warm and dry to the touch, and no marks of violence were perceptible. When Balder gazed upon the clone’s face he saw that his green eyes were half-open, and after a moment he blinked.

“It’s alright, he’s alive,” Balder called to the hovering Warriors Three, finally letting out the breath he had been holding for what seemed like hours. “You frightened us,” he told the clone, sternly affectionate. “Are you unwell? Shall I take you to the healers?”

The clone blinked at him sluggishly again and then slowly shook his head from side to side.

“What’s wrong with him?” Fandral asked.

Balder sighed and sat back on his heels. “They are all upset that I am no longer their king.”

Volstagg bent down to look at the disconsolate clone. “Is it not odd that they are so obsessed with kingship?”

“It’s something Doom instilled in them, I think – no doubt to chain them more effectively to himself. Thor believes it is what enabled them to come to Asgard. Clearly Doom was unaware of the loophole in the contract that would allow them to think of their ancestral king as having a preexisting claim upon their loyalty.”

“Still...” Fandral stroked his chin, “their behaviour seems a touch... over-dramatic, wouldn’t you say?”

“They must wonder what is to become of them all. Every creature needs to feel that they have a place and a purpose, Fandral.” To the clone, Balder said coaxingly: “come now, it is not as bad as all that. You cannot just lie here feeling sorry for yourself until the end of time.”

The clone gave him a distinctly resentful look and slowly sat up. He was covered in bits of dried grass and his dark hair was a thicket of elf-locks – further indications of his distracted state of mind, as Balder well knew how much the five Lokis valued being clean and perfectly groomed.

Balder stood and offered the clone his hand. “Let us go and find the others. Then we will see what we can do.”

The clone hesitated before accepting the hand up. When he got to his feet he did not let go, but linked their fingers together and squeezed, casting Balder a hopeful look from below his long, dark eyelashes. Balder gave him his most encouraging smile.

After a search of some half an hour or so they found a second Loki lying under a bed in a seldom-used guest chamber. Balder and the first Loki pulled him out by his slippered feet and in response he merely blinked at them in mild surprise. He was covered in cobwebs.

The third was in the high-vaulted wine cellar, wedged tightly into the space between a barrel and the wall. Water had been dripping on him steadily from the mossy wall above and painted a long green streak down his cheek. He was also covered in cobwebs.

The fourth was out by the river mechanically plunging his hand into the water over and over. Beside him was a pile of dead fish (and some unluckier water fowl), already begun to putrefy and stink in the afternoon sun.

The fifth was – for some reason – up a tree in the garden. He didn’t seem to know how to get down and it took considerable persuasion on Balder’s part to make him to jump into the blanket being held taut below by the other four.

Reunited, they hugged each other like brothers returned from a great battle – as if their separation had been long and harrowing, and they had not truly expected to see each other again, except in the hereafter. Balder’s pride at being able to alleviate their suffering was tempered by his regret that he was no longer to be at the centre of their long-armed embraces.

Forcing a smile to convey more confidence than he felt, he said: “why don’t you go and make yourselves presentable and I will speak to Odin on your behalves. I feel certain we can find you an occupation so you can stay here with us.”

*~*~*

“What, exactly, can they do?” Odin leaned forward on the Hliðskjálf and narrowed his single eye at Balder, who was trying very hard not to think about any of the recent activities he had himself indulged in upon that very throne – an exercise much like not thinking about pink elephants.

“They are very loyal and attentive my king and –”

“Yes, but what can they do? They aren’t sorcerers. They aren’t wall-builders. They aren’t soldiers, or hunters. Since they don’t speak they can hardly be advisors – so what use, Balder, do you expect them to be to me? The fact is they are nothing more than concubines – are you suggesting I have need of those?”

There was a world of eloquence in Frigga’s raised eyebrow as she turned her head to regard Odin. Balder blushed furiously to think upon the circumstances of his own nativity.

“My lord, I would never... it is only that they live to serve their king, and thus they need some occupation if they are to stay here.”

“And why should I wish that? Do you imagine that it pleases me to see five half-naked copies of my treacherous foster-son roaming the halls?”

Balder took a deep breath, steeling himself for another attempt. “I entreat you to take pity on them. They have no friends beyond this realm and as your steward I gave them my word that I would protect them.”

Odin raised his arm in a kingly dismissive gesture. “Then keep your own promises and protect them, Balder. I wash my hands of the whole thing.”

Balder bowed, swallowing his disappointment as he turned to leave.

He had not trudged more than a few dozen paces down the long central aisle when Odin’s voice rang out, telling him: “WAIT”. Balder swiveled on his heel and remained at a discreet distance while Odin and Frigga had an intense murmured exchange. After a minute or so of this the queen gathered her skirts together and rose from her place by Odin’s side, exiting through the doorway behind the throne to grant father and son some time alone. Odin sighed and raised his head, beckoning Balder closer.

“My lord?” Balder paused a few paces from the Hliðskjálf.

“Frigga tells me that they can sew.”

“Oh, yes! Yes, they are expert tailors.”

Odin shifted upon the throne. “My master of the wardrobe has worn out his eyes in the service – perhaps it is time I pensioned him. Would your five... companions enjoy such work?”

“I believe they would, very much. They would be most cheerful and diligent.”

“Good,” Odin nodded and sat back, resting his hands on his knees and giving his second son a searching look. “Balder... my wife tells me that I am an old curmudgeon.”

Balder ducked his head. “I... couldn’t possibly comment, my lord.”

“Furthermore,” Odin continued, warming to the subject, “she says that I am guilty of ingratitude, for while I like to make a show of my munificence with feasts and ceremonies, I have been slow to show my thanks in smaller and more meaningful ways.” He gave a sigh, the gaze of his single eye wandering across the room. “My wife’s voice is ever that of my own heart.” He turned his stare upon Balder again. “I assumed that because power sits easily with me it does so with others, and thus, I thought little of the burden which my absence placed upon your shoulders.”

Balder clasped his hands before him. “Nothing that is in your service – or in Asgard’s – is burdensome to me, my king.”

Odin gave a half-smile at this. “I confess, I wish that you would not always speak so formally with me, my son. Some of your half-brother’s rash forthrightness would occasionally serve you well.”

Balder’s eyes widened in alarm. “Do you think me insincere?”

Odin gave a rousing laugh, moving from his seat to descend the steps. “No, no, Balder, only reserved.” He clapped Balder on the shoulder and smiled more broadly. “I must accept that I am several millennia too late to be a father to you, Balder. In fact, I think you fared rather the better for my lack of interference.”

*~*~*

Balder hurried from the throne room to find the five clones and share the good news. They were not in their rooms and he hoped they had not separated and gone wandering again. When he did catch up with them they were making their way towards the castle gates. One of them was carrying a hessian sack from which emanated a curious clanking sound.

“Hail, Lokis!” he called. “I bring glad tidings.”

They spun around and regarded him with shuttered expressions, the frontmost four moving to shield the one with the mysterious burthen.

Balder continued breathlessly: “your king, Odin Allfather, has heard of your skills at cloth-cutting and needlework and offered you a special commission as keeper of his wardrobe...” As he looked at them another terrible suspicion entered his mind. “You are not leaving us for good, I hope?”

One of them stepped forward and shook his head most decisively, raising his finger in the gesture that Balder knew meant ‘wait’.

“I... alright. Well, wherever it is you go, please be careful.”

The clone before him nodded and moved away, and soon they all disappeared beneath the shadow of the great stone archway and into the twilight.

*~*~*

Alrik Hildegrimson the smith (for it was he) was woken by a battering at his cottage door. He let out an unmanly shriek when he opened it to look into five pale, pointed faces that were, indeed, the very image of the trickster god’s.

“Please, sorcerers, don’t turn me into aught unnatural! I spoke no ill of you – I meant no harm!”

The Lokis stared at each other and each raised a kinked eyebrow. They then stepped across the threshold and one held out a folded piece of parchment, while another deposited a clanking sack upon the floor, spilling forth a collection of silver forks, candlesticks and other trinkets.

Alrik studied the missive, which was a deftly-inked diagram, and scratched his whiskered chin. “You want a silversmith, not a blacksmith. I make horseshoes – I have not the skill for such fine work as this.”

One of the Lokis came forward and held out a scrap of silk. Alrik unwrapped it to find it full of emeralds – twenty five of them.

“Ah, well. When you put it like that...”

*~*~*

Balder woke at the pale light of dawn and found himself once again surrounded by Lokis. They were perched on the edge of the bed, watching him with their keen, liquid eyes. He considered for a moment how very eerie they were before the pang of gladness and relief caught up with him.

“Ah, there you are,” he said, not knowing quite what else to say. “What is that you have?” he asked the clone who was concealing something behind his back – hoping fervently they hadn’t somehow got hold of the original Loki’s helmet again.

All five of them smiled proudly and the item was produced.

It was a crown of solid silver.

“Ah...” said Balder, feeling his eyes widen. “It’s... this is for me?”

They nodded. One shuffled forward on the bed and gently placed the crown upon Balder’s head, then sat back and clasped his hands together, looking rapturously pleased with the result.

Balder looked upwards. “This... doesn’t actually make me king of Asgard again. You realise that, don’t you?”

They nodded solemnly.

“It is symbolic then?” Balder ventured. “You are trying to say that you still regard me as _your_ king?”

They nodded with enthusiasm.

“That is... very flattering. Thank-you.”

There was the sound of rustling fabric and all of a sudden they were naked and clambering over to him, making him once more the centre of their many-armed embrace.

“Oh, you splendid creatures!” Balder laughed brightly and kissed each in turn. “... Can I take this off now?”

They shook their heads.

Attending to the pleasures of all five while keeping the heavy crown from slipping over his eyes proved to be a challenge, but since they had been so obliging in fulfilling all of his more eccentric fantasies, Balder felt it was only fair.

Each took a turn lying beneath him, supple legs spread wide and ankles supported by two of the others. As Balder rocked into each in a steady and deliberate rhythm – wanting the pleasure to be as long-lasting as it was memorable – the clone he took would look up at him with shining eyes and wet, parted lips, chest heaving with silent moans as he stroked Balder’s well-muscled arms. There was something open in their expressions – as if a door that had been previously locked now stood wide to him.

He wondered if they had ever loved before – probably not, since love must ever go hand in hand with choice.

Afterwards, when they lay in a happy, sated tangle of limbs he glanced at the hand on his chest and dazedly enquired: “what happened to the stones in your rings?”

It was foolish, really, to expect a reply.

*~*~*

It was not a good day to be the lord of Latveria.

Victor von Doom had spent nearly a month in a high security (magically impervious - thanks to Stark Technologies) detention block in the Hague while the pathetic little lawmen debated their quiddities and technicalities.

He wanted nothing more upon his return than to seethe, plot vengeance and have his every whim attended to by his flock of body servants.

Imagine his surprise to find their chambers empty.

The more lowly castle servants tried their best to scramble out of his way, but those whose malnutrition hindered their ability to outrun the coming storm were collared and duly interrogated.

By the time the death toll had risen to six, Doom found himself in possession of the following facts: The Avengers had been in the castle. Thor had led his five beauties away somewhere beyond the castle gates. They were taken without fetters or any visible means of restraint or coercion, and none had since returned.

This information disturbed Doom greatly – worse even than the inconvenience and effrontery of such a loss was this single fact the creatures had gone _willingly_.

He had no use for anything with freewill.

At heart, Doom was more scientist than magician – experimentation and improvement were his hallmarks. The five Loki clones were not the first of his attempts, and nor would they be the last.

“Ah,” he said aloud as he made his way down the stone steps to his laboratory, “perhaps I should thank you, Thor, for showing me the error of my creation. Doom ever strives for perfection!”

As the door swung open Doom took in the sight that awaited him – it was utter destruction.

Things were not merely smashed but _disintegrated_ – upon the floor was a fine, sandy powder - all that remained of any glass components which the room had contained. The rest of his equipment was reduced to twisted metal frames which had, for the most part, melted and fused to the floor. The very walls - which were of sheer basalt blocks – were singed and warped, seemingly with heat.

The Avengers had not done this – for this was not the work of righteous fury, but of vindictive rage.

Sifting through the wreckage, Doom encountered one unlikely item which had survived – it was a scrap of label that had previously marked a test tube. It read: ‘Sample: Loki’.

All of a sudden, Doom felt a searing heat upon his face. He fumbled with the catches of the metal faceplate and cast it down upon the floor where it smoked and curled up like tinder. Across its blank and blackened brow was seared: I KNOW.

*~*~*

Balder wiped the sweat from his brow and shaded his eyes with his hand to watch figures appearing over the brow of the hill.

“I’m not sure,” said Fandral, “that a prince of the realm should be mending fences.”

“It was my brother’s goats who caused the destruction, it is only right that in his absence I should make the repairs.” Balder smiled as he added: “I cannot tell you how happy I am to be outside and doing something useful with my hands. Diplomacy is not my strong suit.”

“I’m not at all convinced that’s true,” said Volstagg thoughtfully as he hefted a fallen stone from the wall back into place.

“Well, let us pause for refreshment then,” Balder dusted off his hands. “Here are the maids with our lunch.”

As the distant figures came closer Balder was able to see that the approaching group was made up of more than kitchen maids. At the back of the queue were five familiar figures, the sun shimmering on the fine-spun fabric of their garments.

Balder waved and strode forward to meet them. “Hello my loves, did you finish your work already?”

They nodded and held out their needle-pricked fingers for him to kiss. When he had done so he looked up to where the Warriors Three stood to finally notice Hogun and Fandral’s expression of mingled shock and queasiness. Only the uxorious Volstagg was looking fondly upon the scene.

“Ah,” he said, blushing. “I forgot you were there.”

One of the Lokis carried a basket over his arm, and it was this one who began to pull Balder by the hand while the others moved to flank him, shepherding him gently but insistently towards a copse of trees that stood some way off.

“Are we absolutely sure that they have no magical powers?” Fandral asked. “Because he certainly behaves like a man bewitched.”

Accepting a laden basket from one of the serving girls, Volstagg sighed. “I wish my wife would bring me special treats in the middle of the day.”

Hogun grunted. “He says they’re not his wives.”

All three snorted with laughter at this.

“Did you ever see a man so deluded?” Fandral appealed. “I suppose he expects us to believe it means nothing that he gave them rings?”

*~*~*

Lying back upon a bank of cool, springy moss while the dappled light filtered through the dense covering of trees, Balder felt very spoiled. One of the clones fed him a sweet wild strawberry, and once he had done so another dripped cool wine upon his lips from a jug, the others eagerly licking up the excess that spilled down Balder’s bare chest.

If there had been a time when he would have protested at the unbuckling of his belt and pushing down of his trousers, he had long since learned that if they were determined to do something – especially when it involved pleasuring him – it was really best to let them get on with it.


	6. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> By [](http://hummingbirdmoth.livejournal.com/profile)[**hummingbirdmoth**](http://hummingbirdmoth.livejournal.com/)

A legend had sprung up throughout the Nine Realms, made up of several legends that had evolved independently and then coalesced.

There was, so they said, a room, deep within the halls of Asgard, that only one man entered. In this room, there were monsters.

In one version of the story, this man- this warrior- went into this room every day because he had to tell them a story. Why? Well, because they would eat him if he didn’t, of course. Every day, he gave them a story, but he never gave them an ending, for if the story ended, they would have no reason to let him live. He gave them most of the story, and promised they would have the rest tomorrow. And come tomorrow, there was still so much story left to tell that he had not finished by the time the sun set, and had to leave off until the following night. And so his execution was indefinitely delayed.

Every time the legend was retold, there was usually at least one cynical personage present who would ask what the monsters looked like, why Odin allowed them to reside in Asgard’s halls at all or why the warrior never simply slew them.

In one, darker version of the story, the brave warrior went into the room every day and they did eat him. Not all of him- a finger, a foot or an eye. He allowed them to sup upon some part of his body, and when they were done they healed him with magic, so that he might come back the following night and allow them to feast again. (‘Oh, so they were MAGIC monsters, were they?’ was the refrain typically heard from the aforementioned cynical personage’s corner of the room at this.)

Tonight, the monsters were teaching the hero how to sew.

“Ow!” said Balder, as he pricked his finger again. He offered it to each of them in turn to suck.

There were five looms, and five sets of knitting needles, and every corner was crammed with silk, and wool, and satin, and with the results of their labours; tapestries, ball gowns, quilts, everything they produced that Odin pronounced too fine or too uncomfortable to be worn in public ended up in here. These included the five sets of dress robes they had made for him that depicted finely woven scenes of the exact moment he had lost his eye in battle. The delicacy with which they had incorporated the blood spray was laudable, Odin had said, but perhaps too… colourful… to be worn on formal occasions.

The five-pointed crown sat on Balder’s head as he stitched. They liked him to wear it for at least an hour for them every day.

Odin was, for the most part, pleased with their work, and even more pleased with their good behaviour. (And when they were in Odin’s presence they were very well behaved indeed.) Soon, he had begun offering them other small tasks. Ridding the castle of mice, polishing his armour, organising the royal library. They picked up any skill he asked them to, from shoe repair to calligraphy. The one thing he never let them anywhere near was his food.

Before long he was allowing them to allowing them to escort Balder on the diplomatic missions to which he was best suited, and they picked up the tricks of ambassadorship as quickly as they picked up everything else. They were required, during such missions, to wear loose-fitting shifts which covered their top halves. They withstood the discomfort stoically, although as soon as they were home again Balder had to soothe the irritated skin on their backs with oil and kisses. 

One thing Balder had never appreciated was how much easier pacifism became when his warm words were accompanied by the five sets of blank green eyes behind him. Within a week of their meeting with the representative of Nornheim, Karnilla had sent Asgard a written apology for the attack on the merchant.

0

And what of Loki the Cursed?

He wandered the Nine Realms, aimless and seething, until such time as he happened upon an abandoned wine cellar. It had not been an abandoned wine cellar before he had appeared in the region, stalking westward and leaving fields burning in his wake, but it was very much an abandoned wine cellar by the time he found it.

He started to drink, and continued to drink. Now drunk, aimless and seething, he did not know where it was he finally collapsed, although the air was sweet and, in his intoxicated dreams, he smelt olives.

“Well, now, what is this?”

He opened one eye, wondering how long he had been unconscious. A woman stood above. Quite a remarkable quantity of woman. Loki was well-trained in the art of looking at something without ever training his gaze upon it, and so managed to keep his eyes fixed on her face while his mind recorded the details of her cleavage.

“Hail, wanderer,” said the woman. She had a throaty voice and muscles in her shoulders that rivalled Sif’s. Effortlessly, she clasped his arm and hauled him upright.

Too quickly. He hoped no one else was present. It would not do for the greatest sorcerer in the Realms to be seen vomiting out everything he had eaten for the last ten weeks (two stolen grapes and a field mouse.) Thankfully, he retained enough presence of mind to avoid her boots, which, he noted as his head was bowed and spinning, were of a fine make. The woman, whoever she was, was wealthy. That, or she was skilled in the art of stealing from people who were wealthy, which was just as good.

“Lady,” he said, rising. She was half a head taller than he, which made her taller than Thor. Impressive. “Forgive me. The road has been long.”

“And well lubricated,” she said. “Who are you, stranger, and why have you trespassed into Olympus?”

0

These Greeks were fools, Loki gloated as he allowed another few droplets of ambrosia to slide over his tongue. His tolerance was high, but the stuff was stunningly potent. He’d made the mistake of swigging the first goblet he’d been handed and had needed to retreat to the cool, airy rooms he had been offered for several hours. (Not so much ‘offered’ as ‘taken’; they had belonged to an orange-haired young man named Mercury, of striking beauty and winged shoes that Loki had also stolen for himself after throwing the youth out of his bedroom window.)

It had been almost too easy to slide into the seat Mercury had vacated, in amidst a throng of drunken Greeks, who, as it turned out, were no more sharp of wit than drunken Asgardians and a good deal more trusting. To the few who had asked, he had said that he was an ambassador. No one had asked where from. Nor he they asked why he was wearing Mercury’s shoes.

The Highfather of Olympus was as different from Odin as Thor was from Loki. Working his way into Zeus’ good graces had taken the course of one meal, although he had shortly thereafter had to work his way out of Zeus’ good graces when the lightning god had attempted to disrobe him in a corridor. Since then, Loki had worked on staying, as the mortals put it, as far below Zeus’ radar as possible. It wasn’t difficult. In terms of radar, while Odin had a Nine-Realm-spanning heat-detecting supersensitive early warning array, Zeus had a small, cracked periscope.

Athena was another matter. He looked into her eyes and saw Odin behind them, as well as Karnilla, and more than a bit of himself. Balancing between attracting too much of her attention and attracting too little was a tricky business, but thrilling. He suspected strongly that she knew exactly where he was from, and likely who he was as well. Which begged the question; why was she allowing him to stay? Possibly the Greeks' famed _xenia_ prevented her from casting out a visitor. She was probably waiting to catch him red-handed in a misdeed.

She would be lucky. Loki had every intention of playing the good guest for as long as it took to properly wheedle his way into the trust of Olympus’ defender, Hercules, who was at least as stupid as Fandral and twice as gullible. Once Hercules was on his side, his position at court would be solidified, he was sure.

0

Two months later, she caught him in the act of turning Hercules into a pig.

He cursed himself, and turned to flee. He hadn’t even meant to do it. But Hercules sounded so much like Thor when he bragged, and he’d taken it into his head that Loki was his new favourite thing. Doing all sorts of unfathomable things, like slinging an arm around his shoulder and bellowing ‘FRIEND!’ whenever they met in public.

Intolerable. People weren’t supposed to do that sort of thing to Loki the Cursed. It was indecent.

He’d scarcely uttered the first syllable of the teleportation spell when Athena pounced upon him, pinning him to the ground with her bulk. Which wouldn’t have actually prevented him from teleporting, had it not been for the fact that Athena’s bulk was something he had admired from afar for many days now, and he felt suitably bad-tempered and caddish to enjoy it while he could. He’d teleport when she let him up to throw him in a cell.

“Hello, little bird,” she said. “What lowly criminality is this? Making off with one of my father’s prize hogs?”

The spell hadn’t been completed, so by the time she’d finished speaking the pig had already shifted back into a startled Hercules.

“Aaargh,” he said, rubbing his brow- impromptu shape-shifting was a disorientating experience. “What did you do to me, you troublesome…?”

“Nothing,” said Athena, and Loki realised with a start that Hercules had been addressing HER. “Your new friend decided to play a funny joke on you. Apparently he is an accomplished sorcerer. Were you aware? I do not remember being informed.”

Loki grimaced as she pulled him to his feet, keeping one hand locked firmly around his wrist. He hadn’t meant for Hercules to actually find out that it had been he who had assaulted him. Irritating as it was to have made a friend, it was far more irritating to have made an enemy through carelessness. He knew how Thor would have reacted in this situation; the look of dawning surprise, the wounded pride, the angry scowl littered with the shards of shattered trust. All so predictable.

And here it came, the look of dawning surprise. And the deep gut-laugh, as Hercules slapped him heartily on the shoulder, so hard he nearly fell over. “Very good! Very good! A sorcerer, eh? Well, maybe I should introduce you to my human friend, Amadeus Cho. He’s a thinky one as well. I have an engagement on Earth with a beautiful redhead, otherwise I’d stay and have you show me other tricks. Prepare some clever ones for when I get back, right? Unless… can YOU turn into a beautiful redhead?”

“Begone, pig,” snapped Athena, and pulled the Norse god away.

“We had our own trickster once,” she said, almost incidentally. She was dragging him into the recesses of the palace. Perhaps she meant to murder him in private? “Her name was Eris. Do you know what I did to her?”

“No,” muttered Loki, wondering if the situation were entirely unsalvageable. If Hercules truly had not taken offence at the jest, perhaps a sincere and knee-bent apology would be enough to move Athena’s heart to allow him to stay among the Olympians. He had plans, and to have them disrupted at this...

Athena jerked him closer, and he saw that they had come to the door of her private chambers.

“I fought her,” she said, “and won. Then we had sex.”

She kicked the door open, pushed him inside, and the next eight hours were the most eventful of his life. An apology was given, at one point, somewhere between the hot wax and the rope, but he felt no resentment in having to give it.

And she did allow him to stay, in the end.

0

Thor had visited Olympus on the pretext of visiting Hercules. In reality, he wanted to investigate the rumours of a strange new presence in the court of Athena Panhellenios, who had ascended to the throne following a mysterious incident in which Almighty Zeus had been transformed into a pig. The culprit had not yet been found and no one had tried to turn him back since he had announced his preference for the form.

When he found his brother, entertaining a flock of maenads with magic tricks, he said, “I can see your knees.”

“And do you approve of them?” Loki replied. His hair had grown longer, and was slicked down with olive oil. He was speaking classical Grecian, instead of the Alltongue. Strange.

Remembering the tense terms on which they had parted, Thor resorted to jocularity. “I fear that togas were made for men with more musculature than you can lay claim to, brother. You bring to mind nothing so much as a handkerchief wrapped around a stick insect.”

“I have never seen you before in my life,” Loki said, placidly, as a maenad took hold of one of his feet and began painting his toenails acid green.

Right, that was about as much jocularity as he could muster in one go. Thor took his brother up, and shook the maenads from him, until all but one had fallen away. That one clung tenaciously to his brother’s foot, and continued to adorn it with polish.

“I have not heard from you in months. I am not in the mood for silly games. Why,” he asked, “are you doing this?”

“Doing what?” asked Athena, descending the marble stairs behind them. “Curb your ire, Odinson, I do not appreciate it when my guests fight. Allow me to introduce you. Thor, this is…”

”There is no need, my lady,” Thor said, bowing deeply. “We are well acquainted. This is my brother, in spirit if not blood.”

“I fear you must be mistaken, friend,” said Loki. “I am but a poor and weary traveller, bereft of worldly means and reliant on the kindness of grey-eyed Pallas Athena.”

Thor watched as Athena rolled her eyes.

“I understand if you are still angry with me,” he said, “but when we are both in the presence of the Skymother I would ask that you keep the childish sulking to a minimum.”

“My queen,” said Loki, in a nasal whine, “this Norse brute has intruded on the peace of your court and is resorting to verbally abusing me for his personal amusement. Is this not contrary to all Grecian principles of charity and-…?”

“You are not Grecian,” snapped Thor. “And you are up to something. I do not know what but rest assured; I will find out.”

He met with Hercules on his way out of Olympus, who was also stalking from the palace in a rotten mood, having fought bitterly with his father for the eighth time that week.

“There is something you must know,” Thor murmured in his ear. “I have already warned Athena, but I fear she did not heed me. Tell your father, if you can bring yourself to it, for it is a matter of most dire import. My brother has come among you. He plots mischief and trickery.”

“Yes, we know,” said the Lion of Olympus. “He’s a riot, isn’t he? Such a perfect little ponce. Athena’s charmed.”

“He has seduced her with wizardry?” Thor said.

“No, not literally. She’s sweet on him. I’d have thought she could do better, personally. But they have a certain manipulative bastard-ness in common. Hate to imagine the children.”

"Friend,” said Thor. “This is no jest. You know not the extent of Loki’s malignancy and cunning.”

“I’ve got sort of an idea,” said Hercules. “He turned me into a pig for no reason. Does he do that to you too?”

“He is mercurial, untrustworthy, petty and far too powerful for his or anyone else’s good,” Thor tried.

“Yes, my father’s like that. You get used to it.”

0

In attempting to escape the spider threads of fate, Loki had slipped from many bodies, adopted many shapes- male, female, child, hag, animal, liquid, vegetable. He had never though that the answer might better be found, not in changing what he was, but in changing where he was.

He stood on a balcony with a goblet of ambrosia in his hand- he was slowly getting used to the stuff- and he thought of the future. This, because he was a god, meant thinking of the past.

The last time he had brought an army to the walls of his enemies, they had been men, armoured and armed with guns, and headed by Norman Osborn’s Dark Avengers. And, because it had been a kind of Ragnarok, accordingly, Loki had died by the time the siege was over. The last thing he had seen before he died had been Asgard’s walls caving in.

The very first time he had brought an army against Asgard, they had been trolls, goblins, frost giants, and that had been his first death; decapitation at the edge of Heimdall’s sword. The last thing he had seen that time had been Asgard’s spires toppling like dominoes.

This time would be different, he thought, as he watched the warriors of Olympus spar in the courtyard beneath his balcony (bless them, Asgard’s elite soldiers didn’t spend nearly as much time shirtless.) This time, he would bring an army of GODS to the walls of his enemy.  
   
This time, he would not die, for there was not a single second of Doom's downfall that he wanted to miss.

Loki smiled, and uncurled his palm. In the centre of it lay a small vial. On the vial was the label; VICTOR.

He would bring gods to Doom’s walls, and he would bring much besides.

0

The sight of the five standing at Balder’s back had become commonplace, and their elevated status of ambassadors of the Realm had earned them a degree of respectability. No one batted an eyelid when Balder arrived at the royal ball with all of them.

Their silver slippers had had tiny bells stitched into them, so they jingled softly as they walked. This was partly for the occasion, and partly for the benefit of all in attendance; the clones had not lost their habit of walking in total silence. To turn around and find one of them standing there often prompted men and women to high-pitched shrieks. Their skin, from their foreheads to their pale chests, had been dusted with a silvery powder that made them shimmer when they moved beneath the candlelight. Despite the trouble they had gone to (for his sake; he knew they hated crowds and so he hadn’t even asked them to accompany him. He had been anticipating an evening of light reading when they had presented themselves to him), no lascivious or even faintly appraising glances came their way. He was evidently still alone in the lust they inspired in him, a fact that both saddened and, selfishly, pleased him.

They waited by his side, eyes scanning rows of the dancers, likely memorising every step- he was certain by this point that their memories were flawless.

Dancing in pairs was a skill he had not yet taught them, and it presented an ethical problem that Balder mulled over as he watched Fandral try to tempt the perpetually teary-eyed Lady Kelda into a dance.

They had doubtless noticed that all of the dances were initiated when one of the warriors asked a partner to dance with him or her, bowing slightly at the waist as they did so and offering his or her hand. But was asking someone to dance a request or was it a show of courtesy? Was one asking for a show of favour, or was one offering it?

If they decided it was a request, then they would not ask him; they rarely openly requested anything of him, and never in a public space like this. And by the same token, if they thought it was a request, then he could not, in good conscience, ask them to dance, for they would be powerless to refuse, whether they wanted to or not. Balder remembered how he had hated dancing when first he had begun attending balls as a youth, particularly how he had hated feeling obliged to dance with everyone who asked.

But what if they decided it was a due courtesy to ask someone to dance? Then they would be compelled to ask him- they leapt at every oppprtunity to make a show of fealty, particularly when Odin was in the room, as he currently was. More, if they decided that asking for a dance was a duty they owed to their king, they might be irritated if he took the initiative and asked them first. While they didn’t mind it so much anymore when he complimented them in public or offered to help them with their chores, they still went cold and unloving when he tried to return their kindness by performing a chore that they thought was theirs.

Like that time when he had tried to feed one of them a strawberry at table, shortly after they had finished feeding him all of his dinner, and had earned five glares as the clone had sulkily opened his mouth and taken the whole strawberry at once, chewing it without pleasure and swallowing as though it were a lemon.

Such thoughts were put on hold as a young, scholarly maiden with whom he shared an easy friendship curtseyed at him, and invited him onto the floor. After looking their way and receiving blank stares in response, Balder allowed her to lead him away.

They shared only two dances. By the time he arrived back, each of the five was holding a sharp piece of cutlery; one was peeling an orange, one was twirling a knife between forefinger and thumb, one was vigorously carving a side of meat, one was stroking the blade with his index finger and the fifth was digging his into the table.

As soon as he sat down, the one peeling the orange stood, bowed, and smartly extended a hand. He didn’t meet Balder’s eyes, and the stiffness of his posture spoke of a rare show of embarrassment. Delicately, Balder accepted his hand, and led him forward.

After ten minutes of spectatorship, the clone was a better dancer then he was after many hundreds of years of practice, the tiny bells jingling softly as they swayed. He danced with each of them in turn, and then again, and then again, until he was panting in exhaustion. Falling back into his seat, he sighed with relief as one applied a damp cloth to his brow.

“Were you jealous, back there?” he asked them. One of them, seated on a cushion beside his knee, took hold of his hand, lacing their fingers together, and gave the bare skin of his forearm three possessive licks.

The hour grew late. When Balder found himself happily intoxicated far passed the point of being able to walk to his room unassisted, never mind dance, two of them danced for him, pressing against one another, their long bodies still shimmering. Emulating the other couples now drunkenly clutching each other as they swayed and stumbled over the tiles. Everyone else in the hall was too thoroughly inebriated to mock or sneer at them.

They seemed immune to the effects of alcohol themselves, although they’d dutifully drunk as much as he had. Between the five of them, supporting him up the stairs to their rooms was an easy task, as was disrobing him, and arranging the pillows about his face so that his hair fell in such a way that it didn't tickle his nose.

The clones arranged themselves, and settled down.

Three hours before dawn, the one curled by Balder’s feet opened his eyes. The one curled by Balder’s left leg raised his head. The one curled by Balder’s right arm sat up, and then they all did.

Balder slept on while all five of them raised their wrists, offering them to one another for inspection. Beneath the white skin, a blinking red light had appeared.

They knew what it was, although not how it worked, for (King) Doom had always liked to keep them just ignorant enough to be able to aid him in his experiments without entirely understanding them. They had all been conscious when he had implanted the small, mechanical devices beneath their flesh, but this was the first time they had ever seen the red light. They knew what it meant, though.

But is it…? asked one, with his eyes.

It must be, replied another, with a furrowing of his brow.

Oh, yes, decided the third, with a tilt of his head, and they all reached consensus with a nod; a distress signal. Come now, it meant. I need you, it meant.

(King) Doom, they had been sure, could not love them anymore, not since they had been so very badly behaved as to leave without a word of thanks. He would surely have been too proud to summon back his disloyal servants for anything but the direst catastrophe.

All his other defences must have failed him, said the fourth with an arching of his eyebrows, stroking the skin of his wrist.

One thing was certain; their creator (master) was in terrible danger, and needed his servants badly.

The clones bit their lips. One of them was rubbing Balder’s thigh. One of them ran a finger over the faded scar on his cheek. One of them looked longingly at the place by Balder’s feet that he had abandoned.

One of them reached below Balder’s bed, and brought out a small, thin knife, one that they used for threads that couldn't be unknotted. With the edge of the blade, he said, If we cut them out, do we think they will explode?

They didn’t. The wounds had to be bound, and then checked over and corrected several times to ensure that each one was identical. The next day, they took the little pieces of metal they had plucked from their flesh and ground them into powder. They shed exactly five tears each, and then went to tend to the morning’s embroidery.

When Balder asked where the new wounds on their wrists had come from, they kissed him, and held him, and said nothing.

 

 END  
 


End file.
